All Nighters
by bluepianos
Summary: The only battle Artemis can't fight alone is the battle against math. Three times in her sophomore year, she sucks it up and surprises herself by letting the Cave's resident speedster help her out. Spitfire. Three-parter.
1. trigonometry

**Words**: 3,700 (exactly, wow)  
**Disclaimer**: I can't even make up my own decisions about what ice-cream flavor to buy at Baskin Robbins. How could I possibly handle the brilliance that is Young Justice?

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trigonometry.

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**Mount Justice  
****April 30, 03:13 EDT**

Artemis is long past being nervous for this test. Now she's just desperate.

Artemis chances another glance at the clock and away from her notebook. She flinches inwardly at the bright and blinking blue numbers of 3:13AM. The team had returned from a relatively simple recon mission earlier at a quarter past nine in the evening and she had immediately changed out of her uniform and into more comfortable clothes before diving into her textbooks and notes.

That was six hours ago.

Artemis pauses, her jaw shaped in a little 'o.' She blinks at the digital clock on the counter of the kitchen before dropping her pen and her head on top of her open textbook. Why did she have to be a hero? Why did she prefer History and English Literature over maths and sciences? Why did she allow her mother to convince her to sign up for all of the advanced classes in _Gotham Academy_, of all places? And how was she even accepted into all of them?

The archer groans at all of the numbers, complaints and worries zipping around in her head. She takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, lifting her head and letting it drop backward onto the top of her chair's backrest. Artemis contemplates shutting her eyes and resting them for a while but knows that doing so would only put her to sleep. And she can't afford to have _that_ happen.

Trigonometry is such a pain in the ass. Sure, Artemis can notch three to five arrows at a time, launch them at completely different targets and hit every single one but unless those targets had anything to do with graphing sine, cosine and tangent graphs, none of her usual talents were going to help her tonight.

Artemis pushes her trig material further away on the counter. She isn't ready to give up quite yet but she's definitely ready to take a snack break. Artemis stands up from her hunched studying position and approaches the refrigerator, cracking her neck and stretching her arms along the way. She lets herself yawn and opens the fridge door to look inside, scratching the back of her neck and flinching a little from the sudden draft of cold air.

Rubbing a bit of warmth back into her arms, Artemis studies the contents of the fridge. Obviously M'gann needs to catch up on her groceries because there's hardly anything to eat. There are leftovers from Kaldur, M'gann, and Connor's pasta dinner earlier that night, Wally had thought to fill the fridge with can after can of different varieties of soda, there's an apple that looks partially edible, a science experiment whose origin could probably be traced back to either Robin or Wally, and a lone cup of pudding. Artemis sighs and grabs the pudding from its position in the middle shelf, as well as a teaspoon from M'gann's tidy drawers.

Artemis has nudged the drawer shut with her hip when she hears another voice enter the room.

"Stealing other people's food now, Blondie?"

She whirls around, almost dropping the pudding she's just retrieved. Standing in the doorway of the kitchen in a pair of red and yellow pajamas is a sleepy Wally West. He's rubbing his neck and looking straight at Artemis, who feels strangely like a kid who's just been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," she says, and it's actually true. She walks back to her place at the counter and leans next to her study material to eat the pudding.

"That's my pudding," Wally says. He narrows his eyes ever so slightly at the archer, who throws him a half-hearted glare as she shoves a spoonful of the pudding into her mouth.

"Sorry, Kid, it's mine now." She watches as he sighs and mentally gives up. There aren't that many words thrown between them right now and who can blame them? It's past three in the middle of the night (or morning, depending on how you look at it) and tomorrow's a Monday.

Wally swears under his breath and walks toward the refrigerator. He doesn't even try to argue with the archer tonight because his aching stomach triumphs against his pride. Unfortunately, just as Artemis discovered a few minutes earlier, the fridge has nothing ready to eat and he swears again, slamming the door shut before leaning on it to face Artemis's ready smirk.

"I was saving that for tomorrow," he tells her. She shrugs and scoops another spoonful of pudding into her mouth.

"Can't do anything about it now, Wallman," Artemis says. She pauses before asking, "What are you even doing up so late?" Wally yawns and pulls a can of soda out of the fridge before responding.

"Got hungry, couldn't sleep. Besides, I could ask you the same thing." Artemis cringes as she gestures to her open textbook, crumpled notebook papers, and the generally messy counter spread she's been living on for the past few hours. Wally walks over to stand next to her and studies the contents of her work.

"It's already three in the morning, my test is tomorrow and for the first time in the history of my entire math career, I'm pretty sure I'm going to fail this one," Artemis moans, setting down the pudding cup and running her hands over her face again in distress. When she hears no response from Wally – no witty remark or smart-ass comment – she looks up. He's picked up and is studying her notebook and one of the scratch papers on which she's scribbled failed equation after failed equation.

"No, no, you've got it all wrong, your reference triangle's all mixed up," Wally says suddenly. He picks up her pencil and flips to a new page in her notebook. The redhead quickly sketches two triangles and gives all six corners their respective angles.

"30° is always on the bottom angle next to the right angle," he points to the triangle he's talking about and Artemis leans next to him to study the triangle. "I always draw my triangles with the right angle at the bottom right so that everything's constant."

"In Gotham North, our math teacher always messed things up and drew different triangles each time," Artemis remembers. Wally snorts and drops the pencil to take a sip of his soda.

"Was he legit?" he asks.

"She. And you mean as a teacher? No. Absolutely not." Artemis frowns, "One time, there was this question we all had to do for homework, I think it was number ten or something. Nobody was able to figure it out and during class the next day, all she said was, 'Well, if none of you got number ten, then you, uh, need to get better.'" Wally grins as Artemis shifts her voice to mock her old math teacher.

"Whatever. You have a different teacher this year, right?" Wally offers. Artemis nods.

"Thank god," she mutters. She takes another look at the new triangles Wally's drawn on her notebook and studies her previous work. As she does, Wally actually looks at her for the first time in the evening and he realises that she's let her hair down for the night. It skirts past her waist and dances along the skin of her exposed thighs as she shifts her hips and moves around to fiddle with her work. He's aware that his heart-rate's gradually picking up and only when she speaks does he take his eyes off of her legs and refocus his attention on the archer's eyes.

"So, wait, you're saying if I just switched everything around…" she picks up another piece of scratch paper, "then all of my answers would be right?"

"Yeah, and there are some faster techniques to what you're trying to do," Wally says. He says it in a tone that's so confident but not at all condescending that Artemis just has to throw in a little bit of haughtiness into the mix.

"I thought Boy Wonder was the math genius in this Cave, not the resident Speedster," she teases. Wally scoffs.

"Babe, seriously, with great science comes great necessity to know math. Boy Wonder knows all the extreme algebra and calc but when it comes to _useful_ math, come to the resident Speedster," he answers with no hesitation.

Artemis puts her hands on her hips and stares at him for a good four seconds before making her offer, "Can you help me pass this test?" Wally finishes off his soda and glances at the clock. "In four hours? Blondie, with my help, you'll ace that bitch." Artemis smirks.

"Alright. You're on," she challenges.

"Woah, hold up. What's in it for me?" Artemis sighs. Of course there would be a catch but she really needs this grade to maintain her scholarship at Gotham Academy. She looks around the kitchen before her eyes land on the forgotten pudding cup.

"You can have your pudding back," she offers. Wally frowns at the aforementioned snack.

"But you already ate some," he argues. Artemis rolls her eyes, "Since when was that ever a problem, Kid Bottomless Pit? You've practically eaten off of the entire team's leftovers by now." Wally snickers. She has a point there. He practically has. Wally reaches over to pick up the pudding cup and Artemis's spoon and starts eating.

"Okay, but half-eaten pudding for a guaranteed 96% or greater on a test?" Wally says with his mouth full. Artemis makes a face. "That doesn't seem very fair to me. What say you throw in something else to even the odds?" Artemis glares at the grinning redhead but whether it's from the fact that she needs help or the fact that he's right, she doesn't know. Frankly, she doesn't care.

"Okay!" she exclaims, throwing her hands up in the air. "What do you want?" Wally dumps the rest of the pudding cup's contents into his mouth and throws it impressively into the open waste basket at the corner of the kitchen.

"Rocky-Road and Cookie Dough ice cream. One large container each. Here in the Cave, tomorrow, by no later than four in the afternoon," he says, crossing his arms. Artemis raises an eyebrow.

"Ice cream? What are you, eight?" she snorts. Wally doesn't react angrily though. He merely smirks back, turns to face the kitchen doorway and says, "The heart wants what the heart wants. If you don't like the terms, I can walk away."

"Fine, fine, fine. You'll get your ice cream. Jeez. Can we just do this?" Wally rolls his eyes and picks up half of her study material before proceeding to walk towards the den.

"Do we have to work there? Everything's already set up here," Artemis calls after him.

"It's too comfortable in the kitchen. Reminds me of food. Got to switch locations," Wally explains. Artemis raises an eyebrow and shakes her head but gathers the rest of her things and follows him to the den. As she sits down next to her newfound tutor, she wonders if she's making the right decision. This is Wally West she's dealing with; extreme flirter, sharp-tongued, and definitely someone who would hold her lack of mathematical knowledge against her. Plus, he's on the top of her black list. Can she trust this dweeb to handle this situation respectfully and maturely, two adjectives that she would never, in a hundred years, use to describe the speedster?

But while Artemis is pondering whether Wally has hidden objectives to agreeing to tutor her, there's also this flooding sense of relief – most of it located in her shoulders. Her head isn't hurting as much, her fingers have stopped cramping, and her eyes have refocused now that she knows that _someone_ in the vicinity is willing to take some of her burden and turn it into real knowledge.

So Artemis decides, to hell with potential obscure intentions. Wally says he can have her acing this goddamn test, then so be it. Besides, it's not like she was making any real progress on her own anyway.

Wally starts immediately after speeding to the fridge and grabbing an armful of sodas for the two of them. He tells her that it's going to be a long night and if she wants to refrain from killing her tutor for the next few hours, she's going to need a little sugar here and there. Artemis doesn't understand the logic behind his reasoning but accepts the can of Coca Cola nonetheless.

He reviews with her what she already knows and what her previous teachers and her current math teacher has already taught her about trigonometry. He asks her numerous basic questions about triangles, rules, angles and identities for about ten minutes and she can see from the look on his face that he's forming some kind of impromptu lesson plan in his head. Artemis has to refrain from being impressed.

This isn't the first all-nighter Artemis has pulled for academic purposes. She's pulled a few before and she knows they're usually meant to be a tedious, fire-blazing-behind-your-eyeballs-until-you-just-want-to-cry kind of activity. Except for some reason, this all-nighter isn't as bad as the previous handful of others through which she's suffered. She stays wide awake the whole time, doesn't feel even the slightest bit bored, and actually gets a lot of studying done.

But _no way_ could the cause all of these unexpected perks be her brand new all-nighter partner. Artemis is _not _grateful that Wally is annoyingly patient when she messes up cosine and sine a couple of times before she gets the hang of finding angles again. She does _not_ laugh when he not only makes good fun of her current math teacher for accidentally giving her a few wrong answers on the answer sheet but also when he cracks lame math jokes every now and then. Lame math jokes are _not_ her thing.

But she wonders if they _can_ become her thing.

The fact that she even thinks about it at all scares her so she focuses again on a particularly difficult problem Wally is walking her through. For a split second, her vision swims with wobbly triangles and she blinks to clear her sight. A little pissed off that she can't figure out how to get this freaking angle because there _just isn't enough information_, okay, and maybe she doesn't know _how_ to find that information, she tosses the pen down next to the paper, startling her redheaded tutor.

"I can't get this. Why should I even try to get this, is this even going to be useful in the real world?" she snaps at Wally. He gives her this helpless, lopsided smile.

"The magic question. Every math student asks that but really? It's pointless to ask. Math teachers don't care if what they're teaching you'll be useful in the future. You're taking this test one way or another." Again, their roles have flipped and now Wally is the voice of infuriatingly logical reason and Artemis is the one bitching and whining.

"What if I forget everything, Wally? This isn't even the hardest question in the unit!"

"Don't kid yourself. This is a pretty tough one. Just go back to the beginning and see what you have –"

"I can't do this. I can't do _math_," Artemis insists, running a hand through her hair. Wally turns to look at her and puts down his pencil. From the corner of her eye, Artemis watches as Wally tilts his head and purses his lips.

"Sure you can." Artemis just scoffs.

"I mean, you're an archer, and a great one. A huge part of archery is mathematical." Artemis bristles at his offhand compliment.

"That stuff comes naturally, I don't think about the math behind it."

"Ah, but that's where you're wrong. Every time you do your 'archery thing,'" Artemis locks an unamused gaze on him at his play of words. Wally just smiles and continues, "you're doing math. And it's just the simple things." He picks up his pencil again and sketches out a stick figure with an impossibly long ponytail which Artemis assumes is her, along with a crude drawing of her bow and arrow.

"Like, what if the wind's blowing really hard and to the East? You adjust your shot appropriately, right?" he adds in arrows and curvy lines that Artemis presumes is the wind.

"Well, obviously, but I don't see how –"

"It's all kind of objective. You're not really thinking about it, but you _are_ doing it."

"What's your point, Wally?" Artemis asks exasperatedly. She isn't feeling any better about her math skills. He shrugs.

"I'm just saying. You're a fantastic archer. And that says a lot about your math, too." Artemis tries to get him to look at her but he stares at his sketch of her with her bow and arrow, a shade of red on his freckled cheeks. Wally rubs the back of his neck. What is he even saying? Don't get him wrong, it's all true, and even if Robin somehow finds out and teases him about it tomorrow, he'll stand by his word. But still, what is he saying and why is he trying to make Artemis What-Are-You-Looking-At Crock feel better? And besides, why does this blonde-haired, steely-eyed harpy always find reasons to make herself feel inferior to others or less than what she really is? Why does she constantly find ways to beat down on herself when no one else is around? And why does he care so much each time?

Yeah, why _does_ he care so much?

Frankly, that question has nothing to do with chemistry or trigonometry and instead of making his head hurt, it makes his chest hurt so he doesn't dwell on it. Wally turns back to the matter at hand now that Artemis has picked up enough self-esteem to finish the problem. And finish it she does; in record time, too.

By six in the morning, the sun is hesitant but still peeks over the horizon of the sea. Wally gives it a glance through the window as Artemis finishes the last of his mini rapid test, which is a combination of his impromptu problems and some of the questions from her textbook.

"Done!" Artemis drops her pen and Wally quickly hits stop on his watch. He laughs out loud in triumph.

"23 minutes! You beat your time." Artemis forces a half-yawn, half-laugh. Only now does she realise that the sun is starting to rise, the critters that reside outside of Mount Justice are starting to make their chattery morning noises, and she still has about an hour before she has to get ready for the day.

"You're ready, Blondie." Wally leans on the arm of the couch and shuts his eyes.

"Thanks, Wallman," she mutters, laying her head sideways on the back of the couch, which suddenly feels ten times better than the comfort of her own bed at home. She closes her eyes and hears Wally yawn.

"Just don't forget my ice cream, harpy," he replies. She grunts in response and as if they've agreed upon the same thing, the two teenagers simultaneously crash next to each other on the couch, sound asleep.

An hour later, at around seven o'clock, M'gann is kind enough to wake Wally, reminding him that he was meant to pass by his house before heading to school. In his state of consciousness, Wally mumbles a thanks to M'gann and focuses on the archer next to him instead, completely forgetting to flirt with the martian. M'gann allows a smile to grace her features before leaving the den to start breakfast for her teammates.

Wally checks the time and decides that Artemis should sleep a little longer for that math test later. He rips a page out of her notebook and scribbles a note onto it.

_Go get 'em, Blondie._

The day goes by like Wally didn't just pull an all-nighter a few hours ago. The bullies are bullies, the teachers are teachers, and school is school. Wally takes a few pop quizzes, hands in some late geography homework, and saves a freshman from having to hand over his lunch money by handing over his own dough. Wally is amazed at how _normal _his life is out of the uniform and his legs unconsciously itch to run, run, run, and to run far away. He goes through the most boring Monday morning since the first week of school back in August and in the five-minute break between Biology and English Lit., he's glad to find a distraction in a new text message from his encrypted team phone. It's from Artemis.

_Aced that bitch. Easy as ice cream._

Wally grins and texts her back as he turns the corner to his Lit. class.

_The Wallman never lies, Arty_.

The phone beeps again as he takes his seat towards the back of the classroom.

_Whatever. But thanks, Baywatch. We should pull all-nighters more often_.

Wally isn't sure how, but he's about 87% positive that this text isn't just Artemis spewing a random statement or making conversation. This is a truce, like a green-light for the both of them to keep going. If by day, they would both remain snarky, annoying and ruthlessly infuriating, maybe by night, they could learn to deal with the other. Wally might be an idiot sometimes but he isn't a (secret, undercover) A-student for nothing. Artemis's offer for more all-nighters is a step out of her comfort zone; her version of a white flag. This is their chance to finally gain some ground and get used to each other. Wally would be stupid if he didn't take this chance. And he is _not _stupid.

By now, Mr. Greenwood's walked into the room and has already started handing out their essays from last class so Wally rapidly presses the keys on the screen of the Batphone, which is what he and Robin call the team's smart phones.

_Anytime, Blondie_.

* * *

This is _part i_ of the three-shot that is _All-Nighters_. Originally, this story was only supposed to be a three-part one-chapter thing made up of three, I don't know, 500-600 word drabbles but then obviously, each part exploded and I didn't want to make a huge, unorganized monster-fic, so there we go! My first Young Justice chapter fic. (I hope that all made sense.)

_Part ii_ has already been outlined and it's about halfway done on my Pages doc. I'll be able to finish it soon along with outlining then writing _part iii_. We'll see what happens because I've been going through a hell of a writer's block for the past few weeks.

Hope you guys enjoyed this even the slightest bit! There are still two more chapters coming up!


	2. logarithms

**Words**: 7,901 (_ooh_, almost!)  
**Disclaimer**: Today, I watched reruns of the first season of _Young Justice_ and shouted at my dad when he didn't understand certain parts. I think that answers things._  
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logarithms.

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_**Gotham's Best**_** Diner  
****May 23, 22:39 EDT**

"_Dorogaya_, it's almost eleven! Won't mama be worried?" Artemis looks up at Ruri, short for Rurík, the only man who worked _Gotham's Best_'s night shifts. She bites her lip and gives him this lopsided, helpless smile.

"She thinks I'm at a friend's," she tells Ruri. He looks at her skeptically and she sighs at him, gesturing at the schoolwork scattered all over her booth.

"I swear, Ruri, I'm on my last subject. Just let me study and I'll leave." Ruri sighs lightly in response and picks up her mug.

"I refill this for you. Decaf." He pauses, not yet making to leave.

"Sometimes I wonder if you get to live a life out of all the work you're always doing, Arty," Ruri tells her quietly in his dainty, almost-but-not-quite-American-and-still-partially-Russian accent before walking to the counter to refill Artemis's mug.

The archer watches him go and frowns. If anyone else had told her that to her face, she would have snapped at them and started a long, unnecessary speech about how she could take care of herself, she could probably handle more than _you_ could, and she was a _great_ student, thank you very much. But this is Ruri, practically her second dad. Or just _a_ dad, if she thinks about it.

Ever since she discovered this 24-hour diner and started spending time here, Ruri's kind of become a constant in her civilian life. When she's not at school, her part-time jobs or running missions with the team for Batman, she's either here or at home. And she's always working. Working on school assignments, chores at the apartment, extra jobs to help out at home – she's just always working and she can never catch a break. Maybe that's partially why she loves the hero business so much. It takes her away from this sorry excuse of a life.

Artemis shakes the dark thoughts away from her mind and refocuses her attention back on math. She wrinkles her nose at the thought of the subject. If she weren't taking math, she would have a perfect GPA. Not that anyone would know. Though Artemis _had_ made it into the school's Varsity softball team as well as their archery team, she still remains careful with who she befriends at Gotham Academy. The origins of her scholarship are still a mystery but she isn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Logarithms?" Ruri reappears next to Artemis with a piping hot cup of coffee. She accepts it gratefully and nods.

"Honestly, math isn't my best subject and I'm only getting decent grades because I've had help." Artemis twists a lock of her hair as she fights the blush at the thought of her redheaded "help" and sips her coffee. It's perfectly bittersweet (heavy on the sweet), just the way she likes it, and she gives a small sigh.

"And this is the last thing you have for the night?" Ruri asks. Artemis nods as she plays around with a corner of her open notebook.

"Well, maybe you should call that help of yours so you can finish up fast," Ruri suggests. Artemis nervously runs a hand through her loosened hair. She'd removed it from its usual position high atop her head a few hours ago. For Artemis, there's a calming factor in keeping her hair down as she studies instead of in its tight ponytail. She reserves that style for crime-fighting.

"I think I can do this," she gulps. Ruri gives her another dubious look and lays a hand on her shoulder.

"_Dorogaya_, I will throw you out of this diner with my bare hands – and you know I would – if you don't finish before one o'clock."

"One o'clock?! I need _at least '_til four o'clock to feel even the slightest bit confident!"

"Then call in that tutor of yours! It's only eleven, he - she - _it_ might still be awake."

"_It_ is a _he_, Ruri." Artemis rolls her eyes at the man's immaturity.

"Even better then. When you're done studying, you can have a little fun before bed. If you're into that kind of fun."

"Ruri!" Artemis doesn't even bother trying to keep the blush from gracing her cheeks even if Ruri's face remains calm and stern.

"Hey, we tutor and pay that way when I was still in school." Ruri shrugs, removes his hand from Artemis's shoulder and turns away from her. Artemis sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose. It's bound to be a long night.

"You have until two in the morning before I throw you out," he tells her.

"Three."

"Two. Thirty. And I'm being nice." As if Artemis doesn't know that already.

"Three." Artemis pauses before adding, "And I'll work the night shift with you for two weeks. No pay." Ruri stands there for a moment and tilts his face in her direction. He seems to consider this before releasing a deep-throated chuckle and walking away from Artemis's booth.

"You drive a good bargain, Arty. Deal. Now call up that _drook_ of yours and get studying!" Artemis sticks her tongue out at Ruri's turned back and lays her chin on her hand.

"He's not my boyfriend," she mutters, the Russian word registering in her head after a few seconds.

Artemis picks up her pencil and taps the eraser onto the table a few times as she looks at her review packet.

"Log base-ten three times log base-ten five…" she mutters, the speed of the eraser's tapping increasing as her frustration grows.

"I don't even remember doing this!" She flicks the pencil away angrily and watches with little satisfaction as it ricochets off the wall of her booth. Artemis glances at her phone. Maybe she won't call Wally just yet. She can totally do this by herself! But… a _little_ bit of help might not hurt.

With the phone pressed into her ear and ringing, soon enough Bette answers, also wide awake and speaking far too quickly for a normal teenager at half past ten in the evening.

"Hello?"

"Hey Bette."

"Artemis! Hi! Sorry, I'm studying for the logs test tomorrow because oh, my God, I can't believe the test is actually tomorrow and I haven't even started on the word problems in the review packet and it's already 10:43 and my mom is going to have my _head_ for this if I don't ace this test and I won't be able to go to the Star City fair next month if I fail and that would just be so uncool, wouldn't you say so, but right now, I just really need to focus on this te–"

"Jesus, Bette, how much coffee have you had?"

"…all of it?" Artemis snorts.

Honestly, the girl drinks a lot of coffee and talks a little too much sometimes but she's quirky, funny, kind of a badass, and Artemis likes her the most out of the hundreds of students in Gotham Academy. She and Bette have been inseparable since Artemis's first day at the Academy, the two blondes quickly making a habit of pranking and trolling countless freshmen and other sophomores (sometimes they fool around with the upperclassmen, too, but only on Fridays). Of course, the teachers don't know about it, lest the pranking taint Bette's prestigious reputation.

Bette laughs on the other side of the line, composing herself.

"I'm sorry, Artemis. Um, you were going to ask me something?"

"Actually, I was going to ask you… everything." Artemis almost laughs at her predicament. "Can you please explain this log thing to me? I think Mr. Norris just rushed through everything."

"Yeah… he does that when he's stressed," Bette mumbles. "Um, I can try but I've never been great at explaining math…"

"What are you talking about? You're sophomore president_ and _student liaison. What _can't_ you do?"

"Apparently teach math."

"C'mon, Bette," Artemis pleads. "I am running out of time here and I haven't even _started_ the packet."

"Wow. Um, alright." Artemis hears some ruffling on the other side of the line before Bette speaks again, "Okay, I guess we can go through the very basics and re-familiarise you with that first." Artemis picks up her pencil and flips to an empty page in her notebook.

"Okay. So, logarithms. A logarithm is a quantity or a number that represents the power to which a fixed number, which is the base, must be raised to produce a given number. That being said, the answer to log base two-eight must be…" she draws out the last word, obviously expecting Artemis to finish the sentence.

"F-five?" Alright, maybe Artemis _did_ call up the wrong person to teach her logarithms at almost eleven o'clock in the evening because none of that registered in her head. There's a beat before Bette replies.

"N-no, Artemis. The answer is three because – well, because the number three will raise the fixed number, which is two, to the eight, which is the given number!" Artemis almost feels guilty because Bette sounds so proud of herself for explaining the concept.

"…S-sorry, Bette, I'm just not following," she confesses. Bette sighs and Artemis hears her mutter a "Figures" before responding.

"Yeah, I'm not cut out for this teaching thing, am I?" Artemis laughs breathily to console her friend.

"Hey, you can always go with Plan B, right? First female president of the United States! Plus, who needs to be a teacher?"

"Yeah, I hate kids anyway," Bette agrees wholeheartedly.

"As long as they're not creepy, camera-wielding freshmen, they're okay," Artemis refers to that one unnamed black-haired boy who so randomly took a picture with her on the first day of school. Almost a whole year later, she _still_ hasn't been able to figure out who the kid is.

Anyway.

"Sorry, Artemis. I could send you a few of the links Mr. Norris suggested! They might help." Bette offers but Artemis already has printed versions of those links scattered all over the table.

"They're, uh, they're not really helping," Artemis mumbles. Bette laughs shortly.

"They're links. Of course they won't help, what was I thinking." There's another pause between the two girls before Bette says, "You should probably call Wally now, Artemis."

_Excuse me? _is all Artemis thinks.

"What."

"Come on, you know there's practically no other option and you said yourself that he's not so bad in the first place!"

"Bette, this is the part where I tell you that you're talking too much," Artemis growls.

"Sorry, Arty, the truth hurts. And denial isn't just a river in Egypt, apparently," Bette replies nonchalantly.

"Excuse me!?" Artemis almost shrieks now.

"You heard me. Oh, and when you've settled things with this Wally guy, can I meet him? He sounds great from everything you've told me."

"I have told you next to nothing about Wally!" Artemis whispers through gritted teeth as she turns toward the window next to her booth and away from Ruri's unnervingly keen ears.

"That's not what I remember last Wednesday!" Bette sings teasingly. That is so not accurate. It was after P.E. and Artemis had been reasonably _exhausted _after basketball – she _so_ hates basketball – and Batman had been expecting her at the cave so she'd been a little tired and dizzy and had been ranting about all things completely _un_important to her. _Absolutely_ unimportant!

"Listen, we both have to study, I'm still running high on coffee, the test is tomorrow and Wally West, whoever this hunk is, is your only choice. Now go call him before you fail this test and degrade yourself to someone who can't meet my standards."

"Bette?"

"Yes."

"Stop talking."

"Gladly. See you tomorrow!" Bette hangs up before Artemis can snap at her friend again. She stares at the accusing screen with narrowed eyes for a few seconds. She knows that she'll end up calling the idiot in a few seconds one way or another because what other choice _does_ she have, really? But she's not going down without a fight.

So Artemis basically waits for five seconds before giving up and holding _3_ on her phone. Okay, so she has him on speed-dial, so what? Her mom (speed-dial #_1_) and Bette (speed-dial #_2_) are still more important than him.

Artemis ignores the fact that she doesn't have Zatanna's, Rocket's or even M'gann's numbers on her local Gotham phone. She has direct lines to them on the Batphone but she has the entire team's Bat-numbers on that phone. Her actual phone is different. She had it way before she even joined the team. It's kind of personal.

So, why Wally West's number is on her personal phone, she's not sure. And why he's on speed-dial and she hasn't crushed the phone with her boot yet, she'll never know.

**West's Residence, Central City  
****May 23, 22:47 EDT**

No one at school knows it, but Wally West is friggin' awesome.

Why, you ask? Well, let's see. It isn't even eleven o'clock yet (that's early for high schoolers, Wally's learned) and Wally finished all of his homework – _everything_: all the assigned sheets, projects, research, quiz and test prep, _and_ he's pumped for the chemistry test tomorrow – between six-thirty and eight o'clock, before that he'd spent three rough hours training with Black Canary and working on his hand-to-hand combat at the Cave, and before _that_, Barry had taken him on an hour-long patrol around Central City prior to the first class bell. Personally, Wally had found it weird to be patrolling a relatively calm city at seven in the morning. There was a very, very small chance that anyone would even be awake to commit any crimes that early in the morning but he was never one to back down from a chance to hang out with his favourite uncle. Wally's had a tough day but he isn't complaining because, heck, he's been playing video games since eight o'clock. What could he possibly complain about?

So, as you can see, Wally is freaking awesome to be able to accomplish _all _of that junk and still have a good four hours of free time before his dear mother screams in his ear to go to bed. Now if he could just convince Robin to get that engraved plaque with the words 'Keep Calm and OMG, Wally West' to hang above his (Robin's) bed in the cave, his life would be perfect.

"Yeah, die, you rotten, no-good Russians!" Wally yells gleefully, blasting his way through Level 36 on the newest single-player installation in the _Dead by Number_ franchise he and Rob have recently gotten into.

"Wally, we are not racist under this roof!" Wally's mom yells from the kitchen. She's baking tonight, which is a bad sign. It means there are hearts Mary hopes to mend and feelings she wishes to console through her extravagant sweets and pastries. But Wally doesn't dwell on that as he blasts through another Russian zombie's brains.

"It's okay, mom, they're zombies!" he yells back.

"We do not discriminate against the undead under this roof!" Wally rolls his eyes but chuckles.

"I'll remember that," he says to himself amusedly just as he passes the level and is given a moment to rest his thumbs. Wally's right knee jiggles in anticipation for the next level and his fingers twitch to start shooting things again when his cellphone rings from its position on the coffee table. His hand goes automatically to his pocket, where he always keeps the Batphone. Having two phones is a little confusing for Wally because it feels like real, physical proof that he's actually living and juggling two different lives.

At the same time, not a lot of people have his cellphone's number except Rob and a few people from school but it's almost eleven so he wonders who could possibly be calling a chemistry geek on a school night. Wally checks the screen and raises his eyebrows. Then he smirks, knowing immediately what a certain grey-eyed, blonde-headed harpy might be needing from him tonight.

"Evening, grasshopper," he quips into the phone, holding it between his ear and shoulder, as he starts Level 37 on the television screen.

"Will you shut up about that?" Artemis's raspy voice bites back through the line.

"Isn't it true, though?" Wally guns through a whole line of zombies and almost whoops ecstatically right into the phone.

"It so isn't."

"Then why are you calling me?" Wally grins when Artemis doesn't reply immediately.

"What unit is it?" he asks, a laugh blending in with the question.

"Logarithms." Artemis sounds pained.

"Good ol' logs? Are they really giving you problems?" he's only teasing but he likes getting under her skin. He always has.

"Wally, I'm already sucking it in enough, okay? Are you coming or what?" she snaps.

"Sorry, Miss Thing. You really think you can just _summon_ me whenever you need a little bit of math tutoring?" Apparently Level 37 isn't as long as the previous levels. He's already reached the rooftop where the boss-battle is supposed to ensue. Zombies are crawling out of every crack on the concrete roof and some of them are even jumping onto the roof from the adjacent buildings. Wally's thumbs fly over the analog controller in a blur as he shoots, reloads, knifes, punches and impressively takes down the lot of them.

"Uhh, yeah," Artemis says as if it's a stupid question. "Especially if Miss Thing is at a 24/7 diner and is offering to buy you anything you want as long as you help her ace this stupid test." That totally gets Wally's attention.

"Anything?"

"Yes. Baywatch. _Anything_." Wally's character has stopped moving on the screen of the TV and within a second, his arm has been torn off by an old granny zombie. Wally blinks and now his character is being swarmed by zombies, but his stomach tunes out the sound of his soldier's aggravated cries and the zombies' guttural feasting racket. All that diner food, free of charge, for an A in a _logs_ test?

"Where are you?"

**The Alleyway, Gotham Zeta Beam Transporter  
****May 23, 22:56 EDT**

Artemis finds herself picking up an impatient Wally West in front of the two buildings that make up the alleyway that holds the Zeta Beam transporter in Gotham. He's clad in his typical outfit, jeans topped with a white long-sleeved shirt underneath an open navy blue button-up that's a size too big. At the sight of him squirming under the flickering light of the lamppost, Artemis feels the corner of her mouth quirk into a small smile as she crosses the street to the two buildings.

"Finally! Could you walk any slower?" The smile falls from Artemis's lips and she remembers who she just called for help. She pauses right in front of the sidewalk, rolls her eyes and steps onto the sidewalk in front of Wally.

"What's wrong, West? Not used to a place like Gotham at this time of night?" she challenges. He narrows his eyes at hers and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jeans with his thumbs sticking out.

"Oh, please. I've been in worse places. I'll have you know that –"

"Can it, Wallace," Artemis interrupts, rolling her eyes. "We've got bigger things to do than argue all night." She turns around and starts walking back the way she came. Wally glares after Artemis before jogging to catch up with her.

"Yeah, because a Logs test is so huge," he says, obviously poking fun at Artemis's situation. She whirls to face him as they stroll down the sidewalk.

"Excuse me, did you have something _better_ to do?" she snaps.

"Yeah! I did!"

"Oh, and what could you possibly have been doing at this time of night that's more important than a test worth 25% of my grade?"

"You know what, Miss High and Mighty –"

"Come on, Wally. I know how you work. You finish everything before your mom even finishes making dinner and for the rest of the night, you play video games and surf the net like the geek you are," Artemis stops walking and puts her hands on her hips, daring him to contradict her.

Wally stands in front of her with his eyes narrowed and arms rigid. His mouth is open and stammering, trying to force out a comeback. Artemis smirks, knowing that she's called him out on his own game.

"Yeah, well, at least I finish everything before the rest of the city even turns on their lights for the night!" Wally pushes his hands further into his pockets and resumes walking in the direction they were heading.

"Whatever, Wally," Artemis laughs as she walks next to him, "I'm pretty sure you're the _only_ teenager that actually finishes his homework before dinner."

"I'm a special kid!" he cries.

"You certainly are," Artemis agrees happily. He glares at her and walks even faster.

"There better be a lot of food for this," Artemis hears Wally mutter as they finally make it to the street where _Gotham's Best_ is located. Artemis holds her tongue from retaliating with another biting remark as he opens the door and steps back to let her in first. She's glad to feel the air-conditioned atmosphere envelop her after being out in Gotham's humid air. Besides Ruri, she and Wally are still the only ones in the diner and she mentally groans because there's _another_ sign that it's getting late and she really _hasn't_ studied at all for this logs test.

Artemis thinks back to the past week, racking her brain for the reason as to why she hadn't studied even fifteen minutes for the test. Not once has she procrastinated while working on other projects and assignments, nor did she miss out on a single mission during the entire week so far (there's only been three but it _is _only Thursday). It's been a pretty normal week, considering who she is. Except, oh, that's _right_. She has that part-time job from four to six at the McDonald's on the edge of Gotham every day and that other job every Monday through Wednesday at the 24/7 café at the gas station near her apartment from four to seven in the morning. She only skips out on her part-time jobs when Batman calls her to the Cave but her bosses are strangely okay with her switching shifts with the other employees, who are all good about keeping to themselves when she doesn't give them a good reason for the shift-switch. She hasn't missed any of her shifts this week so that must have been what's taken up most of her time.

Hey, her mom's in a wheelchair and can't work. Artemis _has_ to pull in as much money as possible from anywhere she can. If she could, she'd happily even take a third job so she can treat her mom to that dainty little French café she always mentions at dinner. Plus, it's not like all this work is taking a toll on her performances at school or with the team. In fact, the only thing the work overload is having a negative effect on is her math grade.

"This is him?" Ruri suddenly asks from behind the counter. The two teenagers stop walking and Wally looks at Artemis.

"Um, by 'him,' if you mean brilliant, life-saving, test-acing, zombie-killing, genius chick magnet, then yes, I am him." Artemis gives him a weird look when he mentions the zombies but she waves it off as another weird thing Wally's probably obsessed with. She quickly slaps him upside the head and he yelps at the abuse.

"Ruri, this is Wally, he's my, uh," she pauses and squints at the subject at hand, who looks back at her blankly, "he's my… my… uh…" she splutters, grasping for the right descriptor, and Wally realises that he doesn't really know what he is to her either.

"I'm her tutor."

"He's my tutor."

They come up with and say the same thing at the same time and Ruri starts to smile, putting all the pieces together despite the fact that he's just met the boy. He bets his salary that these two are attracted to each other like syrup on pancakes or pepper on a steak.

"She's my tutee."

"I'm his tutee."

Their voices overlap again and they're flushing and looking anywhere but at each other and Ruri fights off a laugh. Instead of responding, he reaches behind him and grabs a real plate of hot pancakes from the window that connects the kitchen to the countertop that serves customers. He slides the pancakes onto the counter and gestures for the two kids to come to him.

"Try this," he tells Wally. Wally glances at Artemis, who shrugs, and picks up the fork that's balanced neatly on the side of the plate. He cuts up a hefty slice and deposits the forkful into his mouth.

"Mm," Wally moans appreciatively. "Blueberry?"

"Only my best," Ruri replies.

"You run this joint?" Wally asks.

"Sure do. Every night of the week." Wally grins.

"Then give me everything you got, big man. Ruri, is it?"

"It is. And I'm guessing that I'll be putting it on Arty's tab?" Ruri says with a smirk, nodding at the aforementioned girl who groans and presses two fingers to her temple. Wally grins right back at the large cook and nods eagerly.

"What'll it be first, kid?" Wally purses his lips playfully and pretends to think.

"Surprise me," he says and he can just feel Artemis rolling her eyes next to him.

Artemis rolls her head to face the ceiling in distress and walks away from the counter towards her messy booth. As Wally follows her to the booth, laughing silently, he hears her mutter something along the lines of, "They were not supposed to get along, they were not supposed to get along."

**Artemis's Booth, **_**Gotham's Best **_**Diner  
****May 24, 01:14 EDT**

It's easy for Wally and Artemis to fall back into the pattern they quickly discovered they could both agree on a little less than a month ago. It involves a little bit of food, a little bit of patience, a few of Wally's lame math jokes here and there, and surprisingly enough, a lot of smiling on Artemis's part. Granted, there's also a lot of forehead-flicking, table-slamming, pencil throwing, and enraged growling in her part of the agreement but Wally knows that it's all part of the package deal. No one ever said that taming the dragon was going to be easy.

Ruri's been great about bringing the two teens food every now and then. Actually, he refills Artemis's mug of coffee and brings _Wally_ extravagantly sized dishes like fresh plates of cob salad, hamburgers, french fries and club sandwiches and one time, he even dropped by with a plate of perfectly English fish and chips (Perfect fish and chips? In an American diner? In _Gotham_?). Ever the bottomless pit, Wally wolfs down each dish almost maliciously but he never fails to chew and swallow before speaking in order to help Artemis with a problem.

It's weird because when Artemis is studying math by herself, it always takes some time for the concepts to click in her head. The circumference of a circle equalled both what and what now? And why does _y_ equal that after all of … that? And wait, how is angle _a_ related to angle _b_ when –

It takes her some time but Artemis is a smart girl. Math may not be her favourite subject but she deals with it and gets _great_ scores, which is fitting considering all the effort she's exerting for the stupid subject. (But honestly, she can't wait 'til the upperclass program starts up next year because then she can choose all the advanced literature and history and avoid all the advanced math for the _rest_ of her life.)

What's weird is that when _Wally's_ studying with her, it's like some kind of mathematical mental block has suddenly disappeared. The circumference of a circle _does_ equal two-pi-_r_ and pi-_d_, _of course_ _y_ equals what it equals and she can see that _clearly_ angle _a_ and _b_ are alternate exterior angles. Quadratic formulae are all lined up in organised little rows in her head, the identities of trigonometric functions click when they have to, and finding _x_ is easy as ice cream.

"So because three is the number that raises four to 64, three is the answer to log base-four 64. Remember, all of this," he circles something on the piece of scratch paper they're studying, "will always equal the opposite. And that's all a logarithm is. The opposite of any exponent." Paired with his constant sketches and scribbled numbers, Wally explains everything to Artemis easily and he's just so damn _patient_ and it's killing her because she's not yet completely used to this softer side of him.

"You're really good at this," she says to him quietly, working on the next problem in the packet.

"Good at what?" Wally asks before munching on a french fry.

"All of this," Artemis says, gesturing at all her work all spread out on the table next to his empty plates.

"If you ever think of becoming a teacher, you're not looking in the wrong place," she says, gazing at him meaningfully from her position across the table. He lets out a laugh and rubs his neck, a nervous habit she's noticed in all the time they've spent together.

"I'm more of a chemistry, stand-in-a-lab kind of guy," he tells her.

"Yeah, but, if you ever need to make money, you could make some serious dough out of tutoring."

"I make enough dough out of you, princess," he jokes, tossing a small french fry in the air and catching it with his open mouth. She raises an eyebrow and reminds herself that she _does_ have to find a way to pay for all that food.

"Glad to know I'm special," she tosses at him with a roll of her eyes and he clears his throat, falling silent. Artemis isn't quite sure what to make of that so she looks at review question 21b and finishes it off.

At ten to three o'clock in the morning, Wally's let Artemis loose on the impromptu mini-test he's quickly written for her (again, it consists of problems from her review packet and from her textbook, and some of his own random questions) and since he's got his watch timing her, he's fallen asleep on his arm on top of the table. Artemis hasn't noticed yet because she's on the last question and it's another word problem and she so hates word problems but she's almost got it –

"Done!" she slams both hands on the table, surprising Wally and flinging the pencil into the air in the process. The pencil clacks down back onto the table and Wally jerks awake, bolting up in his seat, and fumbles with his watch.

"16 minutes, 53 seconds. That's your best time yet, Blondie." He's proud but he can't help the yawn from escaping his mouth. The wide smile from her face falls into a slight frown and she tilts her head at him.

"You're never tired after a serious feast like that," she notes, leaning back in her seat. Now that she's done studying (thank _Batman_), she sweeps her loose hair onto one shoulder and relaxes into the cushion of her chair.

Wally blinks his eyes owlishly and shakes his head a little to get rid of his sleepy haze. He reminds her of a puppy that's just been startled awake and she watches him with a soft look upon her eyes.

"I've had a long day," he explains, waving her off.

"What'd you do? We had no missions today. Was it school?"

"That," Wally confirms, "and other things." He starts telling her about his day, from that ridiculous seven-am patrol with Barry, to his Spanish teacher's totally unprecedented pop quiz, and ending with Dinah's ruthless three-hour training session, recalling how he couldn't even feel his knuckles afterwards.

"Not to mention when I got home, my da–" Wally stops abruptly, fearing that he'd reveal too much. He clamps his mouth shut and opts for downing his root beer instead.

"Your what?" Artemis asks, truly confused. He'd been on a roll and she'd been rolling along with him, chuckling when he recounted his multiple fails with Black Canary and scoffing at his fruitless attempts to flirt with their mentor. Now he's suddenly shut down and Artemis can discern the familiar signs of withheld secrets laced all over his behaviour.

"Nothing," Wally says, and he shoots a grin at her that's a better mask than she'll ever learn to conjure for herself. He lets out a short laugh, "It's just late."

"If you say so, Baywatch," Artemis says. She starts to pack up because she knows when to stop prying. She might show him a little (okay, a _lot_ of) hostility here and there but she draws the line when it comes to showing him respect. Artemis holds respect for _everyone_, even imbecilic speedsters like Wally.

Artemis finishes her cold coffee (Ruri doesn't like it when you leave leftovers) and snatches a few of Wally's french fries before he can protest. She smirks at him and hoists her bag onto her shoulder before getting up and walking towards the counter. Ruri's sitting atop an old stool that looks like it's about to break under his weight and his feet are propped up on the counter. He's reading a small, worn book that's entitled something in Russian. Artemis digs around in her bag to get her wallet when she realises that there is _no way_ she has enough cash to cover everything Ruri fed Wally tonight.

"Ruri, uh," she starts, "j-just add a few more weeks to that deal, would you?" Ruri looks up from his book. "I-I promise I'll work this all off for as long as you need me —"

"Wait," Wally interrupts, holding out a hand. "Did you really think I was going to let you pay for all that?" Artemis looks at him.

"W-well, yeah. It's your 'dough,' isn't it?" she says, surrounding the word 'dough' with finger quotations as if it's some kind of classified agreement they'd both approved earlier. She turns back to Ruri, who's content with placing his book down on his lap and watching their exchange.

"Artemis, I was just fooling around. You really don't have to pay," Wally insists.

"Oh, drop it, Wally, I can pay for this," Artemis claims with a wave of her hand.

"Apparently, you can't," Wally presses.

"Are you going to throw me a pity party, Wally?" she snarls, her temper rising. She doesn't need this. Not from him. "Because my _fist_ can show you –"

"Artemis. Stop." Wally declares the two words with a tone of severity and authority that he never uses. It's enough that Artemis actually shuts her mouth.

"Ruri, start a tab for me, will you?" Ruri nods at Wally, already pulling out the necessary materials to start Wally's tab.

"I, uh, actually don't have my wallet right now so I'll pay you back next time," Wally says, scratching his head.

"I'll hold you to that, kid," Ruri says, a friendly smile on his lips. Before anyone else can say or do anything else, Wally grabs Artemis's wrist and pulls her towards the diner's front door. Calling a goodbye to Ruri, the two teens step outside into the three-am air.

Once outside, Wally can feel the the thick air between him and the archer, and it isn't because of Gotham's humidity. In fact, it's a little cooler now after a few hours of darkness. No, there's an uncomfortable tension that's taut in the air and Wally turns to Artemis, positive that he likes it better if they're constantly biting at each other instead of running headfirst into the awkward wall.

"Listen, back there, I - I wasn't patronising you or doing anything to pity you." Artemis turns to him. "I mean, I don't know what it's like for you and your mom but I'd never just let you pay for me like that, okay?" his hands gesticulate wildly under the weak lamp light as he fumbles for the right words.

"This isn't about the money, I promise," Wally says. He's looking straight at her and his gaze is so intense and sincere that she finds it hard to look away.

"I - I have to be a gentleman, I guess? It's just… it just didn't feel right, letting you pay," he finishes off, placing his right hand on the back of his neck. With that gesture, Artemis knows immediately that he's being genuine but she has the feeling that she knew it from the very beginning anyway.

She sighs, "Yeah, I – I'm sorry, too. Just, I kind of freak out sometimes when it comes to money, you know?" She bows her head but looks up at him with an apologetic look upon her face. He totally understands, though. Well, not totally, because he's actually got two parents with good, steady jobs. But he understands her position and why she reacted the way she did.

"So… we're good?" he offers. Artemis lets out a short laugh.

"_We're_ good. You and your tab? Are not." Wally flinches.

"I'll… convince my mom. I figure she'll like this place as much as I do," he says offhandedly. That's a problem for another day. Wally yawns and stretches his arms, placing both hands behind his head.

"Man, I do _not_ feel like going home," he says to no one in particular.

"Burnt out?" she asks. He nods. They're both aware that even with the Zeta Beam Transporter in Central City, Wally still has to run a good thirty miles before he even gets to his neighbourhood.

"Eh. Gotham's got a lot of bench rats and hobos, right? I could totally blend in and they'd never catch me in the morning." He grins at Artemis who looks at him with this exasperated and unamused look on her face.

"Wally, sleeping on a Gotham park bench has got to be the _stupidest_ idea you've ever had," she says.

"Hey, it's only stupid if you haven't tried it," Wally retorts.

"That doesn't justify –" Artemis groans. Before Wally can say anything though, she's hit with an absurd idea.

"Do you," she falters but starts again, "do you wanna crash at my place?" she offers quietly. Wally blanches.

"Uhh, I was - I was totally kidding, I can make it back home just fine, it's only a few miles –"

"Please, Baywatch. You'll break your face running around even the safest city in the world," she says, laughing to ease the mood. He wrinkles his nose but she's right. He's way burnt.

"Come on, you're crashing at mine. Consider it a thank you for taking care of all that food." She tilts her head towards the direction they're going to have to walk and starts to make her way home. When she's sure Wally hasn't run away, collapsed or combusted and is actually following her, she lets out a small sigh.

Thank goodness Jade isn't home.

**Nguyen-Crock's Apartment, Gotham City  
****May 24, 03:35 EDT**

Paula is wide awake and reading a book about the art of Japanese tea ceremony with the TV murmuring softly in the background when the bell at the front door jingles lightly and the door creaks open slowly.

"Mom?" Artemis's slightly hesitant voice carries through the hallway and into the living room, where Paula sits. The two Crock women are used to the other being up late at night. It comes with the hero and ex-con business. Or maybe it's in their blood.

"I'm in the living room, Artemis," Paula calls. She hears some extra shuffling and leans her head to glance down the hallway. Instead of one blonde teenager walking into the living room, she's greeted with the sight of her daughter and a young red-headed man.

"Mom, this… is Wally." Wally smiles at Paula who also offers a smile back.

"Pleased to meet you," he says warmly. He looks at Artemis, who's watching him, "He's, uh, in the same _extra curricular activities_ as I am."

"Oh, you're Kid Flash! _The _Wally West, am I right?" Paula asks. Wally smiles uncertainly, "Uhh, I think?"

"Artemis talks about you all the time," Paula says. Artemis's eyes widen and Wally's left eyebrow lifts high on his forehead while his lips melt into a crooked smile.

"You do, do you?" Wally teases Artemis, nudging her lightly with his elbow.

"I do not!" she hisses at her mother.

"She does," Paula assures Wally. They both laugh and Artemis lets out a frustrated groan before excusing herself to get an extra pillow and blanket for Wally. Paula gets Wally settled on the living room couch and they sit together while Artemis brushes her teeth.

"You like my daughter?" Paula asks innocently at one point. Wally's eyes snap up and he stammers before replying lamely, "She - she's very… capable." He nods as if agreeing with himself that, yes, she is indeed capable. Paula gives Wally a weird look and quietly laughs at the boy.

"Don't you worry," she says, laying her hand on his forearm. "It's never easy the first time around."

"I'm not sure what you mean, ma'am," Wally stutters, genuinely at a loss. She gives him a warm, though cryptic smile.

"You will sooner or later." Paula gives him one last smile, bids him goodnight, and rolls to her bedroom, where Artemis is getting her bed ready.

After helping her settle down in bed, Artemis brushes some stray hair from her mother's face and Paula has the nerve to talk about it right there.

"He's special, isn't he?" She holds some satisfaction in the split second that Artemis freezes in her actions.

"Who, Wally? Yeah," she snorts after recovering quickly, "about as special as a turnip." Paula rolls her eyes.

"You never bring home any boys, Artemis. And this one likes you! Can't you see it in his eyes?"

"_Mom_, my life is not some lame teenage drama on Disney, so please stop treating it like one," Artemis scolds lightly.

"Oh, a few more episodes and you'll see what I'm talking about," Paula teases, reaching up to pat Artemis on the cheek.

"_Way_ too much TV, Mom. Really," Artemis speculates, but she reaches down to kiss her mother on the cheek anyway. Paula pinches Artemis on the cheek lightly before wishing her a good night.

Artemis peeks into the living room, hoping to wish Wally a good night as well, but the speedster's burnt out like a busted lightbulb. He's crashed on the couch with the extra blanket draped over his legs, one arm hanging down to scrape the floor. Artemis smiles when she hears him snoring softly and she walks to her room to get some well-deserved sleep.

She remembers about the logs test she has to take in a few hours but the numbers and floating calculators are blocked out by visions of french fries, grinning redheads and lame math jokes.

**Nguyen-Crock's Apartment, Gotham City  
****May 24, 07:30 EDT**

"Wake up, Baywatch," Artemis shakes Wally's shoulder awake and he mumbles something incoherently.

"Wally!" Artemis says loudly into his ear. Wally's eyes snap open and he jerks away from Artemis at the sight of her so close to his face.

"Wha - where - where am I? What's going on?" he splutters, all flustered.

"You're at my place. We pulled an all nighter doing logarithms, remember?"

"Oh…" It's all coming back now. "Right."

"It's 7:30. I figure that'll give you enough time to get home and get ready," Artemis says.

"Right, right." There's a beat of silence between the two of them.

"This couch is really comfortable," Wally says sleepily. Artemis snorts.

"Um… thanks?" she replies. Wally smiles at her and bends down to pull his shoes on. When he finishes tying the laces, Artemis holds a tumbler out to him.

"What's this?" he asks.

"Coffee. Creamed and sugared. 37 cubes, just the way you like it," she smiles at him. Wally grins and accepts the tumbler.

"You know me too well, Blondie," he says, nudging her again. Her side tingles at the familiar touch of his elbow. She gets up and pulls him to his feet.

"Just give it back at the Cave," she says. He nods and stretches out to prepare himself for his run home.

"Hey, tell your mom I said thanks for letting me crash."

"Yeah, of course." There's another beat of silence and just before it borders on awkward, Wally speaks up again.

"So. Test today."

"Hm," Artemis huffs, "Wish me luck. Might need it."

Wally gives her this thoughtful look and smiles at her.

"Nah, I don't think so," he says with a slight shake of his head. Artemis frowns lightly but before she can open her mouth to ask him what he means, he lays his hand on her shoulder and then he's gone. His sudden departure leaves behind the lingering scent of sweet coffee, freshly baked bread, and scattered leaves, a scent that seems to follow him around everywhere.

Artemis ignores the tingling feeling on her shoulder that his fingers caused and the fluttering butterflies that arise in her stomach. She focuses on getting through the day, acing that goddamn logs test, getting to her job at McDonald's and rushing to the Cave right afterwards.

When she arrives, Zatanna, Raquel and Kal'dur are busy taking Tula and Garth around the Cave on a tour, M'gann is chasing Garfield down on one of their little sibling tag games, and the only one Artemis finds when she steps out of the Zeta Tube is Rob, who's killing time by playing some zombie game on the den's TV. Artemis asks him where everyone else is and Rob tells her about the tour, about the scampering green-skinned siblings, and that Wally's helping Conner fix his bike in the garage.

Artemis walks into the kitchen and stops when she sees her tumbler on the counter. She walks up to it and sees that it's sitting on top of a foot-long receipt that hangs over the side of the countertop. She recognises the logo of _Gotham's Best_ at the top of the receipt and smiles to herself. There's also a rectangular sticky note on the side of the tumbler and she peels it off to read the familiar, scratched penmanship.

_A,  
__Ruri says hi and that my tab and I are "good" now.  
__Passed by your mom to compliment her couch and she told me you aced the test.  
__Who's the resident speedster now?  
__-Wally_

Artemis scoffs and shakes her head. She grabs the tumbler and the receipt off of the counter and walks off to find the Cave's resident speedster, eager to share her logarithmic success with him. She throws the receipt into the trash bin as she leaves the kitchen but tucks the sticky note into her back pocket, smiling softly to herself.

Souvenir.

* * *

You don't know what I had to go through to finish this. Sure, I got to play with Wally but editing a chapter that's nearly 8k words time and time again… is _not_ as fun as it sounds. This wasn't supposed to explode, but I guess I'm kind of glad it did. Last part's going to be outlined soon and I'll try to post it ASAP. Hope you guys liked this chapter!


	3. exams

**Words**: 16,893 (_holy shit_)  
**Disclaimer**: I don't have the chops to come up with something as great as "Request Spoiler, Comment No," so Greg can keep his job.  
**Notes**: Wow, I have a boat loads to say before y'all can actually start reading this but I'll try to keep it short. **Firstly**, my hugest, biggest apologies for making everyone wait so long but hey, I'm not perfect, I don't know how to keep track of time, I can't force myself to squeeze out the good stuff at my level of writing, and I do have school to attend. But better late than never? **Secondly**, as with every single other piece of art and literature, this has its good sides and it has its bad sides. I've learned a lot in the process of writing the entirety of _All Nighters_ and for that, I am so grateful. **Thirdly**, I wrote this in a span of literally five months, from August all the way down to the last day of December, and in little spurts, so that's probably the best explanation as to why there are good parts and bad parts. **Fourthly**, I want to thank the enthusiastic reviewers and followers and favorite-ers (haha, I don't know, bear with me) for, well, having faith in this story and for enjoying it so much. I honestly did _not _expect such fabulous support. This has kind of been like a stupid little side project I worked on whenever I didn't want to deal with real life and I couldn't take it seriously even though it really does mean so much to me. Man, you guys are the greatest fandom.

**Finally**, a whopping, rocking _**Happy New** **Year**_ to everyone! This fandom and show is the greatest thing that happened to me this year, I'm not lying, Young Justice is literally 83.4% of who I am now, so thank you, everyone. The show comes back in only four days and I. am. so. pumped! Now, without further ado, go ahead and please try and enjoy the final installment of _All Nighters_!

* * *

exams.

* * *

**Mount Justice  
****June 1, 19:21 EDT**

One more.

One more exam, just _one_ more exam until Artemis is finished with math _forever_.

Well, okay, maybe not forever, but at least she'll be done with any and every kind of advanced mathematics for the rest of high school, and that's pretty much been her goal for the past five months. The only thing in the way of her summer vacation is this exam and if she passes it, then she's a free bird.

Of course, she still has to pass it. And now that she thinks of it, passing an exam with _this_ much information and content might be a problem. She's flipping through the review packet Mr. Norris gave the class last week that's an inch and a half thick. Artemis's anxiety doubles with each page she meets and by the end of it all, she thinks she's damn well ready to explode.

"No. No _way_ can I study for this on my own!" she exclaims out loud, shaking the offending packet in the air infuriatingly.

"KF, Artemis is talking to herself again!" a young voice calls out from the kitchen. Artemis turns to glare at Robin through the kitchen window. The thirteen year old snickers and continues to scrub the next dish gleefully. It's his turn to wash the dishes after today's Team Dinner.

Kaldur has made it a point time and time again that the purpose of Friday Team Dinners are so that the team can work on their "team building" skills. He thinks that socially interacting with each other over M'gann's and Zatanna's admittedly delicious salads and pastas will improve the team's chemistry, ultimately improving their performances while on jobs. She's not going to tell him, but Artemis thinks that Friday Team Dinner is just yet another affair in which she has to constantly berate Wally and make sure he doesn't say something infinitely rude or overly suggestive to any of the other females on the team. Despite its surplus of laughs and fantastic dishes, Team Dinners haven't been anything particularly special other than a chance to eat with the entire team in one place.

In any case, the Cave's resident speedster and the fastest boy alive suddenly zips into the living room and skids to a stop behind the couch that Artemis is occupying. He's greeted with the sight of the archer sitting cross-legged on the couch looking reasonably ragged and piqued. She doesn't have her hair down and holds it up in a messy bun so Wally confirms that she's not yet in her prime studying zone. He's noticed that she keeps her hair down when she's one hundred percent focused and clearly, right now, she's completely out of it. He leans over the back of the couch and peers over Artemis's shoulder.

"What is it now, harpy?" he asks happily, obviously taking some form of satisfaction in Artemis's current haggard condition. She turns her head to face him and since he's basically hovering right next to her shoulder, there are only a few inches that separate the two teens' faces.

"There is _no way_ I can study all of _this –_" she whips the packet up and shakes it angrily between their faces, "– on my own!"

"Wow, someone needs a serious break," Wally mutters.

"I don't need a break!" Artemis almost shrieks. "I need to ace this test! I need this A! I need - I need a stable mind, or for someone to rewrite my life, or - or a punching bag, or –"

"That's it!"

"What?" Artemis snaps, irked at Wally's interruption.

"You're absolutely right," he says, "you need a punching bag."

"Oh!" Artemis exclaims sarcastically as if she's made the same realisation. She widens her eyes and her mouth and drags out the O but after a split second, transforms her facial expressions so that she's staring at Wally blankly and fixing him an unamused look.

"Are you volunteering?" she asks flatly. Wally rolls his eyes in response.

"You wish," he retorts, "Nope! I'll be your trainer tonight."

Artemis's eyebrows gather in the middle and she throws him this exasperated look but Wally's excited now about whatever it is he's conjured up in his crazy mind.

"No no no, you'll _love_ this idea," he says enthusiastically. He suddenly clambers over the couch, making Artemis yelp a little, and grabs all the study material out of her hands and stuffs it into the shoulder bag at her feet. He slings her bag on his shoulder and stands, holding a hand out to her.

"Well?" he asks impatiently. Artemis looks at his hand and then looks up at Wally.

"You aren't going to get any real studying done like _this_!" he exclaims, gesturing to all of her. Artemis narrows her eyes and folds her arms.

"C'mon, Artemis," Wally grins confidently, "Just trust me."

_Just trust him_, the idiot says. Trust is a tricky and touchy subject, especially for Artemis. Barely a year has she known the boy and he expects her to trust him? Her, a trained heroine raised by some of the world's most wanted and deadly ex-cons and villains (though the team knows that now and still accepts her wholeheartedly, thank _God_)? Really?

She wants to tell him that she doesn't trust just anyone, least of all a clumsy fool of a speedster, but she wonders if that's even true. In a flash, she sees him smiling at her miles above the earth in the Watchtower back in January after the team had relieved the Justice League of the alien tech that had been imprisoning them. She sees their amnesiac selves holding hands as they both dodge a raging and rabid Superboy back in Bialya last September. She sees him during December missions where he'd constantly watch her back and ram into her sister, Cheshire, on countless occasions just so she'd remain unscratched and unharmed.

Finally, Artemis sees Wally standing next to her in the Cave after she's just done the hardest thing she's ever had to do in her life – reveal the truth about her family. She can feel the weight of his arm on her shoulder as a solid and physical representation of the unearthed trust that she thought he'd lost in her and the undying faith that he'd had in her the whole time.

She sees all of this in the blink of an eye and thinks again. _Just trust me_. Can she do that?

_Yes_, Artemis thinks as she rolls her eyes and takes Wally's hand. She most certainly can.

So Wally pulls her up and within a minute, the duo's departure is announced by the voiceover. Back in the kitchen, Robin doesn't hide the smirk that's plastered on his face as he finishes up his chore and places the last dish on the rack.

"It's about time," he mutters to himself, congratulating his best friend silently.

_**The Waffle House**_**, Illinois  
****June 1, 19:34 EDT**

"Where… exactly are we again?" Artemis asks Wally hesitantly as they settle into a booth in the restaurant.

"A little South of Illinois," he replies.

"Illinois?!" Artemis exclaims, "We're halfway across the country?"

"Almost?" Wally confirms uncertainly, smiling lopsidedly. He's used to this kind of travel and has visited just about all of the states in the entire country, save for Hawaii and Alaska.

"Wow," is all Artemis can say before a petite, brunette woman walks up to their table with a small notepad in hand.

"Evening, dollface, what'll it be tonight?" she asks Wally in an over-exaggerated Southern drawl. He smiles cheekily at her as if they're both in on some little ongoing joke and Artemis can't help but watch the two suspiciously as they swap greetings. She clears her throat and the woman turns to her, the crinkle in her eyes disappearing immediately along with the smile on her rosy lips.

"Who's the lucky lady, Wallace?" she sneers. Artemis scrutinises the woman with slitted eyes and Wally covers up a laugh with a few coughs before responding.

"This is my friend, Artemis. She, uh, she goes to my school," Wally says, lying easily through his teeth. Artemis's gaze flickers at him but only for a nanosecond, and she turns back to resume her staring contest with the woman, who purses her lips.

"You didn't tell me you had a new squeeze," she says. Wally's eyes widen and Artemis raises an eyebrow.

"Wh-what, n-no, it's not - we're on the same team - the same track and field team!" he sputters. The brunette grunts and breaks her gaze with Artemis, who gladly turns to make eye contact with the table or her shoes or maybe the dark recesses of a cardboard box.

"I thought track teams didn't recruit just any random broad or is that what athletics are like these days?" the waitress has the nerve to say and Artemis scoffs out loud.

"Who do you think you –" she starts to say but the little lady is just as sharp-tongued and interrupts her coolly with, "I'll bring you the usual, Wallace."

"Make that two," Wally calls from behind his hands, which have smothered his face. When he uncovers his face and places his hands gently on the table, Artemis is thankfully looking away from him, but she _is_ glaring. She's fixated on the spot the waitress was just at, as if staring at it long enough would magically teleport the woman back there so Artemis could give her a piece of her mind. Wally opens his mouth to say something but Artemis beats him to it.

"Who exactly was that?" she says brusquely. Wally laughs almost embarrassedly and sticks a hand behind his neck, a familiar action.

"That's Opal," he says. "She's kind of…" he pauses, looking out the window next to their table, "she's kind of _really_ old-fashioned," he explains.

"Is she always like that?" Artemis growls but Wally's only grins helplessly.

"Yeah, basically. She's great with men and guys and she gives them all the time of the day but when it comes to the next person who doesn't happen to have a Y-chromosome, she's harsh and overly judgemental."

"Hmph. I'll say," Artemis mutters.

"_But_ she makes the _best_ waffles in the country," Wally adds, hoping to placate the archer, "Besides. I think she likes you." Artemis looks at Wally skeptically.

"Please, it felt like she wanted to fry me up to serve with her waffles. Burnt and extra crispy!" Artemis exclaims, wringing her hands in the air to illustrate her distress.

"Hey, be glad she didn't call you a chippy. A broad is pretty good in her books," Wally says. Artemis frowns.

"What the hell is a chippy?" she asks exhaustedly.

"A whore," Wally answers and Artemis flinches, "and that's what Opal calls just about every girl she meets. So trust me, Blondie, 'broad' is good."

"I don't need her approval. I didn't ask for it," Artemis glares again at the spot Opal had previously occupied next to their table. Wally shrugs.

"She likes giving it."

"Wait, does that mean you bring other girls here?" Artemis suddenly wonders, squinting at Wally. He recognises the look on her face as the same one back in Bialya when she, still affected by the amnesia, had wondered how Kid Flash and gender-swapped Martian Manhunter knew each other. Wally's first impulse is to protest and assure her that nah, him? Bring _girls_ into restaurants when they'd sooner run away from him? No _way_, not even in his _dreams_.

But Wally catches himself at the last moment and instead asks cockily, "Why? You jealous?"

Artemis scoffs, "More like _sorry_ for any poor souls that have to hang out with _you_!"

"_You're_ hanging out with me," Wally points out, "and willingly, I might add."

"Funny, because I am regretting that decision with every passing second," Artemis tells him through gritted teeth. Wally grins mischievously and leans across the table.

"One-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, three-Mississippi –" he counts playfully and with flaring eyes, Artemis throws her hands up in the air, slumping in her seat to back away from him.

"You are infuriating!" she cries out, and Wally leans back in his chair, snickering.

"And you're a harpy who needed to get out of a cave," Wally throws back, crossing his arms.

"The only thing _I_ need to do is ace my math exam," Artemis sneers, planting her hands on the table.

"I know," Wally says slowly as if he's waiting for her to catch up to him. That pisses Artemis off a little.

"And I'm going to help you, but exams are different and they're a longer process," he continues.

"I thought you said you were going to trust me," he says nonchalantly, eyes snapping to the walkway next to their table, spotting Opal approaching with their dishes.

"And I thought you were actually going to hold a punching bag for me," Artemis retaliates.

"Good things come to those who wait, Miss Thing," Wally chants happily as Opal sets down in front of them two towers of hot waffles piled one on top of the other, both doused in maple syrup, grunts, and saunters away. Artemis sneers at the woman's retreating form before turning back to her table.

"We'll beat after we eat, alright?" Wally offers jokingly, immediately digging into his syrupy tower of delight. Artemis peers at Wally incredulously over her stacked waffles.

"Am I supposed to finish this?" she asks, gesturing to her impossible dish.

"Well," Wally answers through a mouthful of waffles, "you didn't really eat that much during Team Dinner," he points out.

"I did too eat!" Artemis protests, spearing a waffle with her fork.

"Like what?" Wally retaliates, swallowing his excessive forkful of waffles, "Half a plate of pasta and a glass of water? You call that dinner?"

"I was… busy," Artemis grumbles and she shoves a piece of waffle in her mouth so she won't have a reason to respond. Unfortunately, that little piece of waffle is like a slice of heaven in her mouth and she didn't expect it at all so she coughs a little to try and suppress her surprise. Wally grins at her smugly but doesn't say a thing, choosing to maintain the conversation.

"You pulled a Wally for _math_, Artemis," he tells her. When she frowns in confusion, he downs his glass of water and explains, "Speedsters eat and run all the time, but between all the speedsters, I'm the best at it. So the other speedsters call it 'pulling a Wally' when someone eats and runs." Artemis rolls her eyes.

"Ask the Flash!" Wally protests.

"I can't believe you're comparing me to you," she says dully between bites of waffle. Wally pretends to look offended.

"You should be honoured! To be a speedster is…" he pauses for effect and looks to the distance like a total idiot, "a noble opportunity all on its own." Artemis tilts an eyebrow upwards, unimpressed.

"Lay off the _Game of Thrones_, Wally. It does not do you well," she adds mockingly at the end in a clear and perfectly honed English accent. When he gives her this slightly stunned look, she chuckles and flicks a waffle crumb off of her fork towards him.

"Eat your waffles, you monster," she tells him, shaking her head and rolling her eyes simultaneously, "I want to go kick some ass, like you _promised_."

"As m'lady commands," Wally says with only a dash of sarcasm and a slight bow before digging back into his last few waffles. Artemis eyes him for a brief second, wondering how and why she keeps letting him breach her walls so effortlessly and what his trick is that makes loosening her up as easy as pulling a ribbon apart. No one's ever been able to unwind her so quickly and the thought makes Artemis queasy with a touch of fear as well as the presence of that annoyingly warm flutter in her stomach. She takes a deep breath and returns to her tower of waffles, which remains impossibly tall on her plate.

"Um, Wally?" she says. He looks up, having just finished his last waffle, and raises his eyebrows slightly in question.

"A little help?" she asks reluctantly, motioning to her waffles with her fork. A bright smile grows on Wally's face as he picks up his fork with a renewed hunger in his eyes.

"I thought you'd never ask," he says eagerly before reaching over to swipe some of her waffles.

**New York City  
****June 1, 20:16 EDT**

Wally decides that New York City is the best place to kick ass tonight. After inhaling the rest of Artemis's waffles, Wally stuffs some cash he pulls out of his pocket under his plate and motions for her to follow him. They barely make it out of The Waffle House because Wally has to restrain Artemis from attacking Opal when the woman mutters something akin to "good for nothing broad" before they leave.

Now they're on their individual motorcycles speeding through the streets of New York City, under the bedazzling lights of the towering skyscrapers, now clad in their respective hero outfits. Artemis is in the dark – almost black – forest green version of her usual outfit, bare abdomen exposed to the world in all its muscled glory, and Wally's fitted in a casual version of his typical spandex uniform. Like the outfit he wore for that one failed mission with Kaldur, Artemis and Roy against Sportsmaster and Cheshire in December, he wears black pants with red and yellow patched knees that are specialised to support his speed and help him maintain smoothness while he runs. He's got on a loose, normal black shirt under a maroon custom design biker's jacket with stripes of yellow on the cuffs, collar, and hemlines and his Kid Flash insignia on the back. To the average citizen, the normally flashy heroes look like a pair of teenaged vigilantes on their way to one hell of a smack down. And as a matter of fact, they wouldn't be too far off from the truth.

"You still think Opal likes me?" Artemis yells at him as they zoom along the road.

"She's just jealous," Wally yells back over the sound of their roaring motors.

"Of what?" Artemis demands.

"She's like my second-mom, alright? Or like an aunt or a really protective older sister or something," Wally sputters loudly, "She's just not very good with girls, okay?"

"Okay," Artemis replies sarcastically before she reaches over the side of her bike and with immense power, swings her bow towards something, the green furnished wood cracking against the head of a robber that seemed to suddenly appear out of nowhere.

"Woah!" Wally cries out, laughing at Artemis's eagerness to beat out her frustration.

"Keep up with me," she challenges playfully, already drawing an arrow from the quiver strapped to her back while keeping her bike moving in a straight line.

"Remember who you're talking to," Wally reminds her, sliding his goggles down to cover his eyes, adrenaline pumping through his veins in anticipation of the upcoming brawls.

The two do what they do best systematically and efficiently. Wally and Artemis both hardly utter sounds during their rampage of New York City's vermin except to call out pre-established tactics and exercises to use against their opposers and of course, to release war cries. It's a shame really that Kaldur isn't there to watch their pile of shared accomplishments accumulate in the form of good-for-nothing criminals. Wally thinks that, had Kaldur been here tonight, the Atlantean would have been convinced and impressed enough with him and Artemis that he'd stop worrying about the interaction between the fiery duo once and for all.

Actually, no, Wally thinks that's unlikely. Very unlikely. No matter what the team's leader has tried and _will_ try in the near future, there is nothing on this God-given earth that will ever magically convince Artemis to just calm down and lay off Wally. He's pretty sure of that.

Nevertheless, no one is more surprised than the speedster himself when it's apparent that he and the archer are like the perfect chemical reaction when it comes to fighting. Similarly with her little math blocks during their all nighters, it's as if there was some sort of combat or teamwork block that has suddenly lifted tonight and the two are on _fire._

Wally and Artemis are faced with at least one little battle every five blocks but neither has had as much righteous, ass-kicking fun as they're having right now. Wally's tempted to tell her that maybe they should just travel on foot because the bikes are hardly being used to their true potential when they have to stop every seven minutes and dismount anyway. At one point, Wally reluctantly sends his bike careening into a dark alleyway so he can swerve sharply on foot and trip a mugger who had just robbed an innocent lady of her purse. Wally gives the man no time to get back on his feet when he reaches down, grabs the guy's arms and with some effort, swings him in little circles before flinging him towards Artemis, who pretends they're playing baseball or something because she takes her bow and _swings_ at the guy, the wood striking the man across his stomach, sending him flying back towards Wally, completely KO'd. The redhead assesses their work jokingly and nods his consent before they start off again to sniff out their next victim.

During another instance, Wally gets creative and runs around a small duo of burglars fast enough that the little tornado he creates actually levitates them at least eight feet off the ground. Wally throws a knowing grin towards Artemis, who's standing right outside the vortex, and though she can't see it, it's like she knows what he's thinking because he stops circling the burglars abruptly, allowing them to drop back to the earth and right into Artemis's waiting fists.

A little later, Wally yells at a slender masked figure in an alleyway who's just pulled a knife on some poor teenager who hasn't even gotten the chance to take his headphones off. The dark felon turns to Wally and Artemis and banks it, scrambling up the nearest fire escape in the alley. Wally snorts and dashes to the bottom of the fire escape.

"Manoeuvre seven," he tells Artemis casually as she jogs towards him. She nods and breaks into a run, using Wally's hands a springboard to execute a perfect leap towards the fifth floor (the crook climbs fast). At the peak of her jump, Artemis forces her legs into a spiral, sending a kick towards the culprit's head. The masked figure slumps against the stairs to the sixth floor and Artemis, retrieving handcuffs from God knows where, fetters their wrist to the railing of the fire escape. In all this time, Wally has told the petrified teenager with the headphones to scram and go home because his mother's probably worried sick looking for him.

An hour and a half into their vicious patrol, Wally has been demoted from a Fighter to a Preventer, or as Wally likes to think of it, a Good-Citizen-Who-Speeds-Other-Unfortunate-Citizens-Away-From-Danger-While-The-Archer-Does-All-The-Fun-Stuff. The only thing keeping him from saying something crass and butting into the duo's already efficient system is the constant reminder that tonight is not meant for him. Tonight is meant for Artemis to get rid of all her mathematical worries and, instead of taking her frustration out on him, she can multitask and channel all that hormonal rage into doing something useful and good, like drastically decreasing the crime rate in New York City, for one thing. Two birds, one stone. One very blonde, and exceptionally trained killer stone.

So when it just so happens that a pair of naive kids are running at least two blocks ahead of their parents and these two large thugs materialise out of nowhere and obviously mean to threaten the children, Wally doesn't mind _that_ much when Artemis barks at him to "grab the little guys and I'll take care of the big guys!" He rushes in quickly before either creep can grab one of the kids, hoists a kid under each arm and zips them back to their stunned parents.

"Better keep these two close," Wally tells the shocked adults. The mothers gather their children in their arms and start jogging back quickly the way they were coming. The fathers thank Wally quietly, glance at the direction of the thugs and follow their wives briskly. When Wally's sure that the families have made decent time and are reasonably distanced from the scene, he turns towards Artemis and the two thugs. They're both facedown on the ground, groaning in pain and Artemis is sitting on top of one's back, studying one of her pointier arrows.

"Jeez, you didn't even let me do anything," Wally says out loud as he walks towards her. She grins unapologetically and accepts his offered hand to pull herself up.

The clock strikes a quarter to ten o'clock in the evening by the time the duo approach a mostly abandoned parking lot when they spot a couple backed up into the wall by three men dressed in dirty leather jackets and greasy brown pants. The jeering men don't seem to be armed but are all big enough to pose a threat to the couple. Wally and Artemis race each other on their motorcycles to get to the scene before anything severe can occur.

The bald man to the right snatches the woman's purse from her and the man she's with yells at the three men to back off. He ushers the woman behind him, trying to protect him with his own body, but the ruffians laugh again sinisterly and draw in closer to the couple. The tallest man raises his hand and from Artemis's position driving closer to the group, she can see that he's holding a short, thick wooden club, like the kind that belonged to a Neanderthal or someone who was under-evolved. Artemis sneers to herself, absolutely disgusted. Honestly, the kinds of thugs these days.

Before the hooligan can strike the man down, one of Artemis's steel-tipped arrows impales itself deep into the wood of the club, the force ripping the weapon from the man's grasp. All five civilians gasp in surprise and the three thugs whip around to locate the assaulter. When they recognise the arrow on Artemis's chest and catch a glimpse of the lightning bolt on the side of Wally's helmet, all three men blanch at the same time.

"Let's ditch this joint!" the third man, the group's leader, yells and dashes towards the parking lot's exit, his goons right behind him. They cover about six feet before Wally skids to a stop in front of them on his bike, blocking the way to their escape. Wally tilts his motorcycle, its engine still humming, and plants one foot on the ground. He rests an arm casually on his leg and smirks up at the small gang.

"Going somewhere?" he taunts. The man who had yelled to run growls and lunges to grab Wally but is thrown backwards when the speedster, fast as lightning and using his bike as a mount, launches a sweeping kick at the man's chest. Baldy and Caveman stagger backwards, at a loss of what to do now that their group had dwindled down in number, and finally turn around to run the other way. Wally grins and, now standing, leans back lazily on his bike, shutting off the engine. He watches as Baldy and Caveman help their leader back up onto his feet and run straight into Artemis.

"Evening, boys," she greets them almost pleasantly before immediately launching into a flurry of combos, all the while avoiding the thug's own attacks. She ducks under Baldy's sluggish punches and sweeps his feet out from under him. Rolling back onto her feet, she sidesteps an attack from Caveman, grabbing his arm in the process and, with a brutal growl, flips him onto his back. When she turns around, the trio's leader stands slightly curled after Wally's kick to his chest, but he holds a knife tightly in his left hand. Artemis eyes it for a second before letting out a small, amused sound. From the corner of her eye, Baldy has gotten back up on his feet and Caveman is shaking his head slightly to clear his focus. She's surrounded by all three, Knife Point standing just a few feet in front of her, Baldy a little to her left, and Caveman towering to her right. The only thing behind her are a few cars and the wall of the parking lot and she really has nowhere to go but Artemis has always loved a good throw-down.

She catches Wally's eye, and he raises an eyebrow challengingly – expectantly – from his position perched next to his bike. He knows he's in for a good show and she won't fail to deliver.

Notching an arrow in her bow, Artemis waits for the right moment. Knife Point's left hand twitches and he stutters forward, and that's when Artemis chooses to release the arrow, aiming it straight towards the floor. The smoke bomb installed in the arrow's tip explodes upon impact and envelops the atmosphere with a thick, grey fog. The gang yells out loud in indignation and thanks to her hawk-like, trained eyes, Artemis can make out the figures of Caveman and Baldy lunging towards her at the same time. She leaps high into the air and kicks out at the two men, her thick leather boots contacting their heads and sending them both skidding backwards in opposite directions. Baldy lies still, completely knocked out, but Caveman coughs through the smoke as he slides to a stop in front of Wally. Before Artemis drops back to the concrete floor, she spins one more time and knocks the knife out of Knife Point's hand.

While she's locked in fairly simple combat with Knife Point, dodging a few punches here and landing a few blows on him herself, Caveman groans and notices Wally, who looks down at him.

"Man, this chick is crazy," he tells Wally, still in a stunned daze. Wally grins back cheekily.

"It's finals week," he explains. Caveman's face melts into a look of understanding, "Ohh," he says, as if everything makes complete sense now. Wally nods before remembering who he's talking to. He frowns shortly and quickly leans over to kick Caveman across the face before the man can regain total consciousness, knocking him out completely. Wally looks towards Artemis in time to watch her flip the leader onto his back and bend down to deliver one last blow to his jaw, taking him out in the process. Wally whistles lowly and Artemis turns to him, panting slightly after having exerted enough physical energy to take out three grown men.

"Feel better?" Wally asks mischievously. Artemis snorts coolly and places her hands on her hips, eyeing her partner in crime.

"Maybe," she says, walking away from Wally momentarily to mount her motorcycle. As she starts her engine, Wally speaks up again and the playful tone of his voice obviously means to strike one of her chords. It almost works.

"Who would've known that your version of stress relief is literally beating a hundred bad guys late at night?" he teases her, revving his engine as well.

"Ha-ha. Just be glad it worked, Wall-man. We can actually start studying now," she says authoritatively but as she turns away, Wally catches her yawn lightly.

"If you can study in your sleep, you mean," he points out as they both pull out of the parking lot and ride back towards New York's Zeta Beam Transporter at a leisurely pace. She glares at him shortly in response.

"We're studying when we get back to the Cave, Baywatch," she reasserts firmly. "That was the whole point of this, wasn't it?"

"Sure, sure. But don't get mad at me if you fall asleep when we start revising trigonometry," Wally teases back, grinning when she visibly flinches and wrinkles her nose.

"Whatever, Wally. We're _studying_," she says with a tone of finality, though to Wally it sounds more like her stubbornness speaking. He laughs silently to himself and opens his mouth to make a comment but she beats him to it.

"In fact, I'll race you back to the Zeta Tubes. Last one back has to buy milkshakes after exams are over," she chirps and before Wally can do anything, she twists the handle of her bike, revs the engine and zooms away, quite literally leaving Wally behind to eat her dust. He coughs indignantly and stares at her rapidly departing figure before scoffing to himself.

"What part of _Kid Flash_ doesn't make sense?" he mutters to himself as he makes a detour, parking his bike in an alleyway before getting off. He wastes no time in pulling his goggles over his eyes and, after making sure the coast is clear, harnesses his speed to follow (and inevitably beat) the archer.

**Mount Justice  
****June 1, 22:04 EDT**

"Face it, Artemis, I won! Fair and square!" Wally says, happily rubbing his victory into the girl's face. She aims a kick at his shin that he dances away from, laughing.

"You used your freaking powers, I don't see how that's fair!" she cries aggrievedly, stalking towards the locker rooms to change back into pajamas, civvies, or something more comfortable than her sweaty, dirt-ridden costume.

"As I recall, _you're_ the one who had the head-start and didn't even warn me," Wally retaliates as he follows her into the locker room and detours over to the male's area. He can hear her scoff from the other side of the locker room and grins to himself.

"I am not buying you a milkshake when you _cheated_!" Artemis shouts through the wall of the female's side of the locker room at Wally. She tugs off her mask and throws it into her locker and starts to unstring her bow.

"Then will you just buy me a milkshake, period?" Wally asks playfully. When he gets no response, he stops unlacing his shoes and picks his head up. He's about to call her name curiously but stops when he hears her scoff lightly again. He can just picture her shaking her head, rolling her eyes and muttering under her breath. Grinning widely, Wally pulls off his jacket and stuffs it into his locker. He changes out of his pants and his dry-fit black shirt into a pair of loose jogging pants and a plain white t-shirt. As he places his helmet on top of the clothes piled haphazardly in his locker, he hears Artemis clear her throat from the doorway of the boy's locker room and shuts his locker to walk over to her.

"Make sure I get that A first. Then we'll see," she says, giving him a pointed look before turning on her heel and sauntering out the door.

She _does_ saunter, Wally thinks. Or maybe it's just the way he tilts his head forward, and a little to the side, that makes it _look_ like she's sauntering. Whatever she's doing, that _walk_ of hers has him staring after her retreating figure and his eyes are raking down her ponytail's endless stream of golden hair, all the way down to that fine, pert –

– um.

Math. Right. Math.

Wally shakes his head to clear it of all inappropriate images of Artemis's rear end and follows the archer into the Cave's den. She collapses onto the sofa with a great, heaving sigh, shuts her eyes and scoots upwards so that the length of her body is taking up the entire sofa. Wally comes to stand in front of her and throws the archer a sneer, seeing that he's left with no room to sit. He rolls his eyes and excuses himself to make a well-deserved trip to the kitchen. He tells himself that it's well-deserved because he hasn't burned this many calories in such a short amount of time ever since that one sparring session with Black Canary back when Artemis was still working on logarithms. Except, another part of him – a small but incessantly loud part of him – says that it's well deserved because he didn't once try to make a move on Artemis the entire night, despite the fact that he really wanted to.

No, you don't understand. He _really_ wanted to (still wants to, unfortunately). Especially whenever the golden-headed wonder showed each and every single hooligan in New York just what she was made of. Or when she'd grinned at him helplessly under a stack of waffles because she couldn't have finished _half_ of that tower even if she gave it her best shot. Or after every smirk she'd thrown at him while they literally zoomed through Broadway, arrow after arrow, fist after fist, just the two of them. Kid Flash and Artemis, taking on the streets of New York.

This could be a thing, he thinks. Wally West and Artemis Crock and New York. Or it doesn't even have to be New York. It can be in Bali, Tokyo, Athens, Manila, Johannesburg, heck, he can run them anywhere in the world as long as it's _the two of them_ against whoever has the guts to face them. It could totally be a thing, Wally thinks. And he thinks he wants it to be thing.

But does _she_?

He wrinkles his nose, and banishes the thoughts away, disappointed that he'd even consider the idea that the two of them could work out. In this universe? Oh, please.

Wally sighs and runs a hand over his face before quickly whipping up two batches of speedster chocolate for himself and for Artemis. He even adds a teaspoon of coffee into each of their cups, seeing as Artemis insists on staying up tonight to study for her math exam.

He's got some witty remark positioned on the tip of his tongue as he walks back to the den but before he gets a chance to use it, he stops in his tracks right next to the sofa that Artemis is occupying. The archer is out cold and snoring softly on the den's sofa. She's curled into herself in the time Wally's been in the kitchen and her head is tucked comfortably within the fluffy pillows M'gann and Zatanna handpicked from IKEA a few months ago. Somehow, she's pulled her ponytail lose before passing out so that layers of yellow blanket her shoulders and tumble down across her back. There's hardly any light in the den but somehow, her hair shimmers, like gold.

Wally feels a soft, lopsided smile quirk its way onto his lips before he can help himself and he places the two mugs of now-unneeded chocolate onto the table in front of the sofa. He rubs the back of his neck with his right hand, genuinely confused as to whether he should bring Artemis to her room or just bring a blanket out here. Would she rather sleep in her own bed and in the privacy of her own room, or would she not mind waking up to the sound of M'gann cooking breakfast in the morning? Is it normal for her to crash on the sofa like this all the time or is it just because it's exam week and she's running low on daily juice? Would she freak out if he carried her to her room and, you know, _touched_ her, even if the action was executed with nothing but her interests in mind? He has no personal interest in touching her - his fingers aren't twitching to just sweep her off the couch - he's just being a gentlemen. …Duh.

In the end, Wally figures that it's probably safer to bring a blanket into the den instead of physically bringing the archer to her bedroom, if only to ensure his own safety. He rushes to her quarters and grabs the blanket off of her bed. When he skids back into the den, she's not moved at all – in fact, she looks twice as cozy the way she's laying on the sofa and Wally has to fight off a yawn himself. He drapes her comforter over the length of her figure and slowly, maybe a bit hesitantly, brushes some of her hair away from her cheek. Artemis lets out a small, unintentional sigh in her sleep and he wonders if she's dreaming. If she is, he hopes it's only about good things – lovely things.

He brings the two mugs of chocolate back into the kitchen, leaves them in the oven, and walks to his room as slowly as possible, musing over this entire situation to the best of his abilities. Images of Artemis come flooding into his head and he can hear her snarky comments, glinting eyes, and that challenging eyebrow that never seems to drop from its position high on her forehead whenever he's around. At the same time, he can see her peering at him uncertainly that one time he told her that she _is_ good at math and it's all just objective; he can hear her sincerely commending his patience and his abilities to teach; but most of all, he sees the smirk - that stupid half-smile, complete with slightly parted lips, that goddamned crooked eyebrow, and a sparkle in the grey of her eyes - that she never gives Dick or Conner or Kaldur. She _never_ pulls it out when Zatanna or M'gann are around and he's noticed that she only directs it at him, as if she saves it _for _him. He swears his heart swells to thrice its appropriate size at that thought and Wally has to pause in the hallway to get ahold of himself.

_Goddamn it, you are falling for her, West_.

Ooh, boy.

This can't be good.

**Mount Justice  
****June 3, 15:23 EDT**

"Robin, you are positive neither Min Ho or Thomas will die?" Kaldur asks from his position against the wall. Wally looks up from his Spanish homework and notices the book Kaldur holds in his hands. _The Scorch Trials,_ it says on the front, and Wally grins. He knows the book - or the series, since it's the second book in a trilogy - heck, it's landed a spot on his top five favourite books of all time and for once, Dick completely agrees with him. He and Dick have been trying to get Kaldur to read the series but their leader had only succumbed to their prodding and poking (literally, and with the corners of hard-covered books) when he had finished _The Hunger Games_, which had been Dick's recommendation. (Honestly, though, Wally doesn't understand the appeal of that series.)

When he gets no response, Kaldur looks up from his page and directly at Dick, who's sunk deep into the side of the sofa next to Conner and M'gann, completely enraptured by whatever's on his Batphone. Wally rolls his eyes and snorts quietly. He picks up an eraser from the low table he and Artemis are occupying in front of the sofa and flings it at Dick's head. The eraser hits its mark and almost knocks Birdboy's shades off of his nose but Wally only snickers at his best pal.

"Dude!" Dick yelps, hurriedly fixing his sunglasses back onto his nose. Wally rolls his eyes again exasperatedly.

"If you were listening, bird brain, our leader here was addressing you," he informs Dick casually before returning to his Spanish conjugations.

The whole team's clocking some time inside the cave this Sunday. They've all got something to do for school for the entire day, well, all of them save for Kaldur and Dick, who's kind of a genius at Gotham Academy and doesn't _need_ to study but still does and even when he _does_ study, he finishes everything within two hours.

(But Wally can basically do the same so he's not jealous.)

(…Artemis is the jealous one.)

Kaldur doesn't attend school on the surface world so he keeps busy by trying to familiarise himself with the ways of the land-folk by listening to the radio, watching some TV here and there, and, more recently, reading books. Zatanna and M'gann try to feed him novels from the emotional and romantic genre but that hardly works when Wally and Dick are there to look out for a brother. They try and get him as many real books as possible – books with action and trauma and blood and actual badass main characters, like _The Maze Runner_ and _The Scorch Trials_ and maybe Kaldur'll like the series enough to finish it off with _The Death Cure_. He liked _The Book Thief_ well enough (it had been one of Wally's suggestions) and so far, he's liked everything that both Wally and Dick have been suggesting so at least M'gann and Zatanna aren't getting their paws all over Kaldur's poor, naïve Atlantean brain.

Kaldur and Dick are really the only anomalies in the picture. The rest of the team (excluding Zatanna, who's volunteering at an orphanage for the majority of the day, and Raquel, who's babysitting her cousin) is currently either doing homework or studying for exams. Conner's and M'gann's exams line up perfectly with Artemis's and the three of them will technically be done with school by the end of next week. Wally's exams, however, kick off the _following _week and he'll be the last one in the team to finish off school for the year. Needless to say, Dick laughed at him about it for a good three days when he found out.

"How're the quadratics going, Blondie?" Wally asks Artemis, leaning over her shoulder to inspect her work.

"Fine," she mutters as she factorizes one of the easier problems. She sounds downright miserable doing mathematics on a Saturday so Wally places his hand on her shoulder. She turns to him with a partially raised eyebrow (he hadn't expected anything less) and an impatient look in her eyes.

"One thing at a time. Alright?" Wally says encouragingly. The challenge in Artemis's eyes softens and she sighs, but she sticks her chin up, nods at him thankfully, and turns back towards her study guide.

Wally leans back onto his elbow and picks up his Spanish homework. He allows himself a proud little smile behind the papers, one that Artemis can't see, but one that Dick can easily spot from where he's sitting. The thirteen-year-old snorts and hurtles the eraser from earlier right back at his best pal. The eraser launches through Wally's Spanish papers before it pings off of his forehead, effectively pissing him off immediately.

"Dude! What's your damage!?" he cries, bringing the back of his hand up to rub his forehead. Dick snickers at Wally and shakes his head at him.

"Nothing really, Mr. West, I was just hoping you could help me with my trigonometry homework," Dick sings out loud mockingly and Wally blushes, eyes flickering to Artemis, whose pencil freezes above her notebook, a tinge of pink gracing her cheeks. Kaldur picks his head up from the contents of his book and allows himself a small, amused smile at Robin's teasing.

"Do you guys _always_ study this loudly?" Conner complains from behind his textbook. Wally catches a smile on M'gann's features from the corner of his eye but the Martian doesn't look up from the chemistry textbook perched on her lap.

"_I'm_ not studying. Don't really have to," Dick says cockily, placing his Batphone on his lap so he could lace his fingers together and rest his hands on the back of his head. He's leaning back against the pillows of the sofa that he, Conner and M'gann are occupying – the same sofa Artemis had slept on just two nights ago, Wally notes – and he looks far too comfortable on an exam weekend.

"Well, Boy Wonder, unlike you, _some_ people still have to spend time re-studying everything they learned in class, so if you don't mind?" Artemis snaps, turning her head to glare at the boy. He beams at her cheekily but raises his hands in surrender and doesn't say anything.

"If I may interrupt," Kaldur suddenly says and everyone turns to the Atlantean expectantly, "I was wondering if, after all of your final exams, we could perhaps spend some time as a team next Friday?"

"Don't we spend enough time together as it is?" Dick jokes. Kaldur smiles and shakes his head.

"I was hoping to perform one of the surface world's customary favours – of which I've recently learned – and… _treat_ you all to dinner." Now he's gotten everyone's attention and even Conner looks up from his textbook to stare at Kaldur with what could be called a questioning look.

"Uh, I don't want to make it seem like I'm complaining about _food_, of all things," Wally starts, "but… why? And with whose money? I mean, it's not like you have a job or anything." Artemis glares at Wally scoldingly and jabs him in the side with her elbow. He yelps out loud and looks at her reproachfully, rubbing the throbbing skin.

"Well, why not?" M'gann speaks up for the first time, "I mean, I know _I'll_ be glad to have a little bit of a night out after a week of exams. I'd love to, Kaldur!" she agrees, beaming pleasantly at the Atlantean. He nods gratefully and opens his mouth again to respond, but Dick beats him to it.

"Yeah, sure, cool, I'm in, too, but what's the occasion, Kal?" he asks, clearly intrigued. Kaldur smiles to himself bashfully for a split second. He doesn't answer immediately and it's almost driving the rest of the team mad with curiosity.

"Next Friday happens to be my date of birth," he reveals to the team, and M'gann gasps.

"Whaaaat!" Wally exclaims, eyes gleaming in excitement.

"Kaldur!" Artemis adds in a slightly scolding tone. She chucks her eraser at the Atlantean, who catches it easily, fully aware that her light abuse is her unhinged way of showering him with love.

"Why didn't you tell anyone?" Artemis asks in partial disbelief, turning her shoulders to face Kaldur.

"I had not thought it would matter… this much," Kaldur tries to explain, clearly not expecting such a reaction from his teammates.

"Are you kidding me?" Wally cuts in, "Birthdays are huge! I am _so_ in!" The rest of the team nods (Conner shrugs) and Kaldur beams at them, albeit a bit timidly.

"Then… it is settled. Perhaps we could all meet here at the Cave before night falls and we can all choose a restaurant together," he says, breaking into Team Captain mode and discussing their entire plan of attack already.

"Whatever you decide, we'll be okay with it, Birthday Boy," Wally laughs, interrupting their leader. Kaldur nods gratefully at Wally and returns to his book, a content and relaxed aura washing his presence. Everyone falls back into a comfortable silence and returns to what they were all previously doing when Conner picks his head up from his chemistry textbook again.

"So, does this mean I have to get you a present?"

**Mount Justice, Seaside  
****June 3, 18:39 EDT**

Wally's editing his English essay on his laptop and sliding his bare feet back and forth on the soft, golden sand that covers the Happy Harbor beach. He hits _Save_ just as Artemis plops down next to him and grabs her math textbook from the sand, flicking her flip flops off to the side.

"So, who's washing the dishes for you?"

"Kaldur, since he's the only one without any real academic obligations," she mutters, cricking her neck and flipping to a marked page in her notebook. "His words, not mine," she adds.

"Speaking of Kaldur, what're you going to get him?" Wally asks.

"Kaldur? For his birthday, you mean?" Artemis replies, not looking up from her notebook.

"Yeah, I mean… he's got enough books to last the entire summer, he has Robin to give him all of the movies or shows he wants to watch, and there is no way in hell I'm getting him a speedo," Wally rants. Artemis looks up and gives Wally a disgusted look.

"Good, because guys don't give their guy friends tight, ball-hugging swimwear," she snarks sarcastically. Wally rolls his eyes.

"So what are _you_ getting him, Blondie?" he retaliates. She shrugs, unfazed.

"I don't know yet. Probably something that'll remind him of the sea, though. Of Atlantis, you know?" Artemis muses.

Wally hums thoughtfully and nods to himself slightly as he shuts his laptop. He leans back on his elbows and just basks for a moment in the gradient of the marble-washed sky. Furthest up above his head is a deep sea of the darkest blue, dotted with careful, twinkling stars, but when Wally rakes his eyes down closer to the ocean, the blue melts into a faded violet, and then into a glowing orange, almost vermillion. The sun doesn't set as early as it did back in January, and he's glad he's caught this sunset. He can still spot the faintest strokes of cotton decorating the sky and the streaks of white smoke that the occasional jet had left behind. Wally tunes his ears into the sounds of his environment and he's met with the constant _shhhh_ of the ocean, that soothing, rocking movement of the tide. The birds are awake but they're quieting down, settling into their homes, like he probably should be doing soon. And he realises that this medley of sounds, the assortment of colours, and the mélange of his surroundings are all telling him that he is content. And he is satisfied.

For some reason, this leads Wally to think about last night: of the revelation that he could possibly, may probably, and most likely have a crush on Artemis. A teeny, weeny, tiny crush. _Minuscule_. But in the light of June sunsets and the nearby presence of kickass crime-fighting teams, Wally realises that's he a lucky son of a bitch and he doesn't have much to lose.

"So… you studying in the cave for the rest of the evening?" he asks.

"I'm going to be wherever you're going to be, Baywatch," she responds with no hesitation, carefully sketching a small triangle on the corner of a new leaf in her notebook, having moved on to trigonometry in the last hour.

"Oh… but, uh, what -" Wally sits up and clears his throat, "what're you going to do when I have to go home?" Artemis freezes for a split second and stops writing.

"Um," she begins, "I was kind of hoping you were just going to crash here and study with the rest of the team?" Wally kind of laughs because there is no way his dad is going to let him do that, after that fight last week.

"There is no way my dad's going to let me do that after last week," he accidentally lets slip. Artemis finally looks up and Wally catches a mixed look of concern and confusion. He clears his throat again to switch the subject but she narrows her eyes and jumps in before he can say anything.

"What happened last week?" she inquires quietly. She watches carefully as the usual spark in Wally's eyes dies a little and they're not so emerald green anymore, in fact, they look a little pale. The next moment of silence stretches out for just a few seconds but time slows down so that the anticipation is palpitating and the air is choking Artemis. Even the waves aren't doing much to soothe and banish her worries.

"Nothing worth talking about, that's for sure," Wally mutters, mostly to himself. Artemis stutters, having not expected an answer like that, and she gropes for words.

"Oh," she blindly searches for the right thing to say. From all of the hints he's been accidentally dropping in the past year, Artemis is guessing that Wally doesn't have the best relationship with his dad. But what the hell is the right thing to say in a situation like this? Shouldn't she know? She has an asshole dad, too.

"Then," she begins again, turning her body to face him and nudging his arm with her elbow so that he'd look at her. When he looks up, she continues, "When you feel like it's worth talking about, you can talk to me, you know that, right?" Wally looks at her blankly but in a flash, the spark's back.

"Really?"

"Well, of course," Artemis says, as if it's obvious. Wally grins, and she frowns, and the way they react off of each other is so _normal_, it makes Wally grin a little wider.

"Even if it doesn't involve tutoring you for your next logs quiz?" he teases. Artemis huffs and rolls her eyes at him.

"For your information, I haven't asked you a single question in the past two hours, you bigheaded prick," she snaps, picking up her pencil again. Wally snorts.

"Umm, _excuse_ me, but who needed a review on the _sine_ rule _just_ an hour ago?" he challenges.

"Whatever, just shut up!" Artemis bites back quickly, an embarrassed rosy hue shading her cheeks. Wally chuckles in satisfaction and lies back down in the mattress of soft, warm sand. He lets the archer cool off for a while before speaking up again.

"And for _your_ information, you're welcome to come over at my place and we can keep studying there. You can even crash if you want," he offers in what he hopes is a steady voice. The whisper of Artemis's pencil scratching on her notebook is all the response he gets and he wonders if she even heard him but she replies softly, "Thanks, Wally… I appreciate the offer, but – "

"Then it's done. We'll have dinner here and Zeta home at, like, eleven," Wally says. Artemis glances at him and sighs.

"Your parents won't mind?" Artemis asks hesitantly.

"Are you kidding? My mom's probably going to freak that I'm actually bringing a girl home," Wally muses loudly before she throws a startled (and slightly ticked off) look at him and he realises what that implied. "N-not that we'd be going home l-like _that_! You know, a-and I mean, it's _my_ home, not yours, so it wouldn't be like we'd be going home _together _but you –"

"Just shut up, Wallace."

**West Residence, Central City  
****June 3, 23:07 EDT**

"Are you sure your parents won't mind?" Artemis asks one more time, shifting her duffel bag on her shoulder and shuffling her feet on the front porch. Wally shakes his head as he fumbles around his pockets for his keys.

"You're _not_ sure, or _no_, they won't mind?" Artemis pries. Wally lifts one finger to try and silence her. Truth be told, he's a little nervous that he _is_ bringing a girl home because a) his mother _will_ freak out and her ridiculous imagination will devise some sort of weird story that Artemis is his girlfriend (in _what_ universe?!) and b) his dad's going to be suspicious. And definitely not happy when he finds out that Artemis is part of the team.

"Wally. I need to know if I have to run my ass back to the Zeta tubes or –"

"Just, shh!" Wally waves a hand in front of her face, finally fishing his keys out of what turns out to be a pretty deep left jean pocket. "If we're lucky, they're asleep," he tells her quietly, creaking the door open slowly.

"Should I be worried?" Artemis asks in a whispered voice as they step into the West residence.

"What? Of course not! Come on, living room's this way," he says in an equally hushed voice that doesn't ease Artemis's worry at all.

The two teens walk slowly and cautiously down the hallway towards a dimly lit room. Artemis takes a few glances as they tiptoe through the hall. Though there's hardly any light, she can just make out the smatter of photographs decorating the walls. One in particular catches her eye and she lags behind to take a closer look.

It's a photograph from more than a few years ago, that much is obvious. The photo is simple; one of Wally and his mother. He looks like he's about five or six years old, maybe younger, and the wrinkles on Mary's forehead and on the corners of her lips now have vanished in the photograph. Wally's in a graduation gown the same colour as his eyes, clashing with the red of his hair. His mother is holding him close to her chest, her chin resting on his shoulder, and she beams proudly into the camera, helping him hold up his certificate. Wally's smile is shyer and more reluctant but he apparently managed to get both corners turned up before the flash of the camera. Artemis assumes that Wally's father had taken this photo but as she scans the rest of the hallway, she realises that Wally's dad must have had the camera glued to his hands for the past sixteen years or something because he's in hardly any of the photos. She opens her mouth to ask Wally about it but he calls to her first.

"Artemis?" Wally whispers, finally noticing that the blonde was no longer with him. She turns to the doorway of the living room and, glancing back at the hallway of photographs, opts to ask him later. The blonde walks briskly towards the living room where Wally waits but as soon as her bare feet touch the carpeted floor of the room, the previously dark room suddenly lights up in a wave of fluorescent white.

"Woah!" Wally exclaims, throwing his hands up to shield his eyes from the sudden brightness. Artemis does the same but quietly, ducking her chin and turning her head downwards, away from the ceiling lights. Her irises are burning a little and she stumbles forward to grasp Wally's arm for stability. They both know what's coming next.

"Nice night, kids?" a scolding, motherly voice asks steadily. Artemis looks up looking very much like a deer in the headlights. Wally lowers his hands and blinks a few times to get rid of the swimming blobs of neon green, orange and purple that swarm the corners of his vision. He immediately spots his dear, dear, _precious _mother standing on the other side of the room, where there is another doorway that leads to the kitchen, and instinctively steps a little closer to Artemis as if doing so would protect her from the inevitable onslaught of intrusive questions.

The movement draws Mary's attention to Artemis and she clasps her chest dramatically and releases a theatrical gasp.

"Wallace West, where are your manners! Who is this lovely lady?" she says in a thick, overdone 60s drawl and Wally rolls his eyes at her antics, at the same time irritatedly muttering something about not calling him by his full name.

"Mom," he begins, gesturing to Artemis, who releases his arm suddenly as if he's on fire, "This is –"

"Darling, you are absolutely _stunning_, especially your hair!" Mary gushes, dropping the accent and moving forward so quickly, Artemis almost staggers backwards.

"Uhh, thank you?" Artemis replies, throwing a look at Wally that clearly says _God, please don't let her eat me, _and Wally rolls his eyes again, but it's directed at the red-haired woman gawking at Artemis.

"Mom, what are you doing?" Wally whispers furiously at his mother. She winks at him and turns back to Artemis, "I didn't know my boy could choose so well!"

"Mom!" Wally groans embarrassedly as both he and Artemis flush a bright red. Artemis's eyes widen and she gulps visibly, suddenly deciding that the hem of her shirt needs some serious fiddling. Wally knows that he needs to stop his mother's madness before it really escalates into something he doesn't want to deal with. He decides to use one thing that kills the mood in the house no matter the day or situation.

"Where's dad?" he asks brusquely. The teasing glint in Mary's eyes fades away entirely, the smile melts from her lips, and she turns to address her son directly.

"He's been upstairs for a few hours now," she replies after the shortest second, "looking for you." Wally cringes inwardly, hoping Artemis doesn't notice. (She does, she just doesn't let him know.)

"And shouldn't I be the one to ask questions? Why are you kids coming home so late?" Mary asks, forcing herself to brighten up again, as she ushers the two teenagers to sit with her on the couches around the living room.

"Well, it's finals week next week, and Wally's been helping me restudy all the math I've learned this year," Artemis explains, taking a seat next to Wally on the burgundy couch. "He said it'd be alright for me to crash here? I could take the couch."

"Oh, nonsense, we have a guest bedroom that hardly gets put to use. You can definitely sleep there," Mary says, waving Artemis's previous suggestion off. Wally throws a smug grin at Artemis in an I-told-you-so manner and she elbows him discretely. Mary watches their interaction with feigned disinterest but she can hardly keep the smile from growing on her face.

"I'll just leave you two to it then," Mary declares after a second, "help yourself to whatever's in the fridge, Artemis. We all know Wally will," she jokes, standing up and reaching over to ruffle her son's hair lovingly.

"And I trust that the _only_ things you'll both be doing is either eating or studying. No hanky-panky? None of that business?"

"Mom!"

"I'm kidding. Work hard, kids!" she says, dashing away before Wally can say anything else. He sighs and apologises to Artemis quietly. She waves it off and gives him a relaxed smile.

"Come on, remember my mom? It's fine. You could say we're even now," she says calmly before asking suddenly, "Hey, can I get water or juice or something?"

"Yeah, help yourself," Wally responds, gesturing to the kitchen doorway. She gives him a whispered thanks before walking off. Wally rubs his neck tiredly and gets up to stretch. He's able to stretch out the kinks in his back before he hears his mother calling for him, this time from the foot of the steps in the hallway. When he reaches her, there's only the faintest twinkle in her eye, but also that cloud of fatigue that's been threatening to encompass her entire being for the past few years.

"You okay, mom?" Wally asks her immediately, placing a hand on her shoulder. She shakes her head reassuringly.

"I - I'll be fine. I just told your father that you're home now," she whispers. Wally raises an eyebrow.

"Oh? And?" he squints his eyes ever so slightly when his mother fails to respond immediately. She sighs instead.

"You know how he is," she tries to explain, but Wally huffs and turns his head. "Maybe - maybe he'll understand soon, Wally. You just have to be patient." Wally whips back to look at her straight in the eye, his own flaring brightly.

"I've been patient for a little more than sixteen years, Mom," he says sharply. "What more does he want?" Mary's mouth opens and closes to no avail and she chooses instead to reach forward and place her hands on Wally's shoulders. She's actually standing on the first step of the stairwell so that she almost reaches Wally's height. Sometimes she makes bets with herself on how many steps she'll need just to reach up and give her son a hug when he is no longer a teenaged boy, but a man. Her thin hands, exhausted from years of cleaning, baking, caring, and loving, flatten out the cloth at Wally's shoulders and her fingers catch his chin, forcing him to look into her hazel eyes.

"I know it's hard," she starts, and Wally successfully resists the urge to roll his eyes again, "but he'll come around, he usually does." She offers her son the smallest of hopeful smiles, "Where did you think you got your stubborn streak from?"

"Certainly not from you," he replies, eyes softening. Mary almost deflates with a relieved smile. They'll both let this paternal error pass again. They've done it before, sometimes with more hope than now, other times with none, and almost always with absolutely zero-percent certainty of whether things would ever be okay.

"Go on," Mary says, nudging Wally towards the living room, "you have a guest." Wally nods.

"Night, mom," he leans over to kiss her cheek and walks back to the living room. Mary holds onto the railing of the stairs and watches his retreating back before looking up to the second floor and taking a deep breath. She climbs the rest of the stairs with thoughts of Wally in the back of her mind.

Wally and Artemis spend the next handful of hours studying their asses off. Artemis crams and reviews for her math exam, obviously, and Wally makes the final touches on his English essay, sends it off, and starts his last biology report for the year. He'll study a little for his first exam – Spanish – later.

When Artemis reaches quadratics and functions and her pace starts to slow, Wally drops his notes on translation and transcription and scoots closer to the blonde.

"Do I need to expand this?" Artemis mutters in a puzzled whisper, tapping the clicker of her pen on one of the review problems. Wally leans over until their shoulders touch and squints at the problem.

"No, just plug it into the calculator and then do _y = 52_ so you can find the point of intersection," he explains, reaching over to the coffee table in front of them to hand Artemis her TI-84 calculator. She thanks him quietly before punching in the right numbers and symbols and makes a little "Ohhh" noise when she gets the answer. She scribbles the answer down below the problem and moves on to the next question, a little more rejuvenated than when she began the page. Wally glances over at the archer and smiles at her fondly. But just to make things clear, he isn't _proud_ or anything.

…Okay, maybe he is a little.

It isn't important though, and what matters is that Artemis finishes all of her review material so she can at least go over her in-class notes before the exam. Wally's glad that she's one of those students who makes a huge effort to try and catch every little detail the teacher explains in class. Her notes are meticulous and precise, and though they're a little overachieving, frankly, Wally thinks they're excellent.

They work efficiently in that familiar, quiet rhythm they learned months ago. Wally occasionally focuses on his biology report, but puts his laptop aside whenever Artemis reaches over to tap his knee when she comes across an unfamiliar question. Artemis channels all of her energy into tackling each and every page of her review packet and though some of the questions need more time for her brain to process than others, she works her way through the material, slowly and steadily. There's a brief moment when she finishes one section that she gets to breathe for a minute. In this time, she looks curiously at her "study buddy," as M'gann has taken to calling them. Normally, Artemis's feelings for the redhead would consist of either irritation, exasperation, gratitude, or something else that she can't quite put her finger on – something that occasionally keeps her up at night and reminds her of pine trees and cinnamon rolls – a scent he always carries around with him – waffles, and walks in Gotham's rain-stained streets. Tonight, however, a new feeling joins the already overflowing armada: worry.

Every now and then, Wally glances at the ceiling as if he's trying to see past the concrete and into the second floor. Sometimes he's typing or clicking around creating diagrams for his report when suddenly the clacks on his computer will pause. From the corner of Artemis's eye, she watches him as he tilts his head slightly, as if he's listening for something in the house. He even swivels his head around occasionally to look at the doorway leading to the hallway.

Wally is clearly uncomfortable in his own household and that makes Artemis uncomfortable, because up until now, she had thought that _he_ of all people should be the family guy. The one whose parents hug tightly every night because they're aware of how lucky and how blessed they are to have him. The one all the neighbours know as the good kid, not because he's actually a hidden superhero, but because he's _Wally West_, the kid who offers to mow your lawn for you on summer afternoons, or helps you unload your groceries from your car or something, or plays with your kids sometimes when they're getting too rowdy at home. Artemis just always had this image that Wally was the kind of guy who loved his neighbourhood. Or maybe he really does, and there's just one little thing that's stopping him from really considering it as _home_.

And at this point, Artemis is 94% sure (94.7% if you're looking for three significant digits) that is has something to do with his dad. But she's still 5.3% _un_sure so she decides to ask him.

"So, I really don't mean to pry," she starts, "but, uh, tell me about your parents. I mean, you've met mine," she says lamely.

_What the hell?_ She thinks to herself angrily immediately after the words come out. She tries to keep a straight face on when Wally gives her a weird look. He laughs uncertainly.

"Umm, talk about understatement of the year. I hope you haven't forgotten that I've fought your father. Alongside _you_. He's … kind of a supervillain," he reminds her cheekily and she throws him an exasperated look.

"But your mother, I like. Very much, if I should say so myself," Wally adds in quickly. Artemis smiles at him.

"You should tell her that. She likes you too, you know," she says. "But, I mean, like, with your dad. What's he like?" she presses gently, taking note of how Wally's kind eyes instantly solidify into a more solemn, darker green.

"Oh, well," he fumbles for words, "my dad's … a serious guy." Artemis waits for more but he appears to have nothing more to say.

"I'm guessing you get your all your jokes from your mom's side then?" she jokes, trying to keep the painful conversation going but it's obviously not getting anywhere and she isn't learning anything new. Unfortunately for Artemis, Wally has the conversation covered.

"Look," he says to her sharply, "if this is about, I don't know, how weird I am with my dad or something, could we not talk about it?" Artemis turns away, ashamed, and looks at her hands.

"Sorry, I – "

"I _know_ you mean well," Wally continues in a strained voice, "but it really just isn't one of my favourite topics." Artemis turns her head to face him.

"Wally…" He's facing her, too, but he doesn't quite meet her gaze. Instead his eyes meet the burgundy arm of the couch next to her, where some of her notes sit, and then they zip over to the wall behind her, and then they land on her hands, but they flitter everywhere except at her eyes.

"I mean, what do you want me to say?" Wally stammers, and he can feel his heart start to speed up in distress, "That my dad practically hates me? Th-that he hates the life I'm living? How I'm trying to be a superhero while pretending to be a normal kid at the same time? That he hates trying to keep up with me or dealing with the stress of it all?" he spits it all out in a rush and Artemis is wide-eyed and taken aback by the flurry of emotion on his features. Wally freezes, realising that his little secret's out and he sighs at her in frustration, burrowing his face in his hands, elbows resting on his knees.

Suddenly all the tension is building up in Wally's chest and though he tries his best to keep his mind clear, the only thing he can hear replaying in his head is the big, fat, "I don't care anymore," that his dad had thrown at him last week with the thickest tone of finality Wally had ever heard in his life. Kaldur couldn't compete and not even Batman could have matched it.

"Fine. It's your life. I don't care anymore," his dad had snarled, before stomping up the stairs to his and Mary's bedroom. Wally had stood there at the doorway, chest heaving after shouting at his father, stunned at the response. He remembers having looked down the hallway at his poor mother, leaning against the doorway, hands covering her mouth, tears gathering in her eyes. Wally had looked at his sneakers – yellow and red – in shame, turned around, grabbed his bag and headed for the cave. He hadn't returned home that night.

The book bags against the couch, the notebooks and papers strewn on top of the coffee table, Artemis's review material lying on the arm of the couch and Wally's glowing laptop with blinking the words _Warning: less than 20% battery_; they all sit forgotten. In the farthest recesses of her mind, Artemis is glad that she's finished most of her review material, despite it now being almost four in the morning. She's pushes those thoughts even further away as she watches Wally fume in silence. Artemis feels a pang of sympathy go out to him and she reaches out hesitantly. She touches his hand gently and though he flinches, he doesn't move away.

"Wally, I – "

"I'm sorry about that," he sputters suddenly, "I didn't mean to freak out o-or – "

"No, Wally, _I'm_ sorry," Artemis says, leaning forward now and grabbing his hand. He looks at her.

"I'm sorry for asking," she says embarrassedly at first, "but I'm sorry… about your dad."

Wally gulps and Artemis feels a weird sense of déjà vu crawl on the back of her neck except they've both swapped places and this time, he is the vulnerable one with a secret he's not proud of, and she is the hand he's longing will lay on his shoulder. This is not unlike when Artemis needed that pressure on her own shoulder late last December, letting her know that everything was okay and no one was judging her, especially not him. He needs to know the same thing now.

"I have no idea how things are going to turn out with your dad, and I have no way of knowing, but I think he's a little blinded right now if he doesn't realise how lucky he is," Artemis says in a sincere, steady voice. Wally has the nerve to look at her curiously.

"Maybe he can't keep up with you right now," Artemis continues, making sure he's still looking at her straight in the eye (anything related to math is just fading away in the distance), "but you _will_ find a way to make things work out with him," she says earnestly.

"I mean, I always go on about how I'm one of a kind, but you…" Artemis squeezes his hand, "you saved a little girl and her entire country in one night, you've never let your best friend down, and you keep this team together." Wally tilts his chin down slightly but she doesn't let him look any further away from her. With one hand, she reaches up and grasps his chin, forcing him to look back at her. She's way too into the moment to let any of this escape that empty, air-filled head of his.

"Even if your dad doesn't see it right _now_," Artemis flattens her palm on his cheek, "_I_ think you're something else." Their gazes stay locked for a moment longer and though his eyes aren't yet the twinkling stars they usually resemble, there's a touch of gratefulness and relief in them. She's close enough to see the corner of his lips tremble upwards in a ghost of a smile, a real smile.

"Thanks, Artemis," he whispers, and his breath washes over her and he smells like pine and mint and the last of the spring winds. Artemis is suddenly aware of the callouses on her bow-worn fingers pressing into his smooth, freckled cheek. Her stomach clenches and her breaths are catching in her throat with every second that passes. She isn't alone; her eyes flicker to his lips when his tongue darts out to wet them, and her brain processes what could very likely happen in the next few seconds.

Math is the last thing on her mind.

"I feel like this is when I'm supposed to kiss you or something," she breathes out nervously. The part of her mind that's still sober and not intoxicated with all things Wally West berates her for blurting out something so stupid but the rest of her mind is pressing her forwards, just a few inches closer.

"It feels like that, huh?" he whispers. His eyes are darting all over her face and he can hardly remember what they were talking about – something about saving a little girl, his dad being blindsided, and making something work out. Honestly, the only thing he wants to work out is this. Lucky for Wally, his brain catches up before his hormones do something else and he places his palm over the hand on his cheek.

"But if we're going to have a first kiss," he says, pulling her hand down to his lap, "I don't want you to feel like you did it only because you had to."

"What?" Artemis mumbles, and almost immediately, the love-struck haze clouding her mind is blown away by humiliation, confusion, and something that feels terribly similar to disappointment.

"Wally, I am the kind of girl who does things because she _wants_ to do them, I thought you'd know that by now," Artemis says with a slight frown lining her brow. Wally almost panics when he notices the frown but he also notices that she doesn't back away from him. He laughs shortly with this realisation and snakes his hands up her arms, just to make sure she really doesn't move away from him.

"No, I know that, believe me I do!" he insists and he takes so much pleasure in the fact that Artemis Crock is halfway in his arms, flustered, and blushing.

"A-and, I just – " he sighs and shakes his head slightly, red hair flicking around gently, "I can hardly believe that you - you'd want to - and with me!"

Artemis gives him this confused look like he isn't making any sense but it's got a touch of adoration in it, too, so Wally doesn't completely falter, "It just… doesn't feel…" he pauses, and it sounds kind of lame, but he really _does_ look into her eyes searching for the right word, "_perfect_ right now. And I want it to be perfect for you."

Whereas Wally usually ruins sweeter moments between the two of them, Artemis is starting to melt inside and she can't afford anyone finding her as a puddle of goo in his hands. So she rolls her eyes. And he can feel the corners of his lips turning up in a smile.

"You better make it count, Baywatch," she threatens him through gritted teeth, only gritted because she knows no other way to reel her hormones back in. Before she knows it, though, he's leaning over and she can feel his lips pressed lightly on her jaw. Artemis can't help the gasp that escapes her own lips and she looks at him with a slightly wide-eyed look when he pulls away. Wally licks his lips again nervously and she wants to simultaneously ravish them and punch him just so he'd stop _doing_ that.

He doesn't give her a response, which is infuriating, and instead gives her this really genuine and apologetic half-grin, and his eyes are finally twinkling again, and all the hormonal turmoil she thought she'd gotten rid of comes hurling back at her.

Maybe she shouldn't stay over after all.

**Nguyen-Crock's Apartment, Gotham City  
****June 4, 04:28 EDT**

He places her down gently on her feet in front of the door to her apartment and steps back as she dusts herself off. He'd run her all the way from his house at Central City to Gotham and he isn't even panting. Clearly all traces of previous teenaged angst had been swept away when he was running.

"Thanks for running me home," Artemis tells him, making a face along with Wally when they both realise how weird that sentence sounded. He grins at her.

"Yeah, don't mention it," he reaches up and rubs the back of his neck bashfully and it's so endearing and familiar that in a span of a split second, Artemis leans up, steadies herself on his shoulders and plants a kiss on his jaw, right where he'd kissed her earlier. She steps away and bites her lip and she knows that there's probably a really special glint in her eye and she doesn't care because this is all weird and exciting but she's trying her best to take things step by step, kind of like a math problem.

"Night, Wally," she whispers breathlessly before turning around to reach for the doorknob. She doesn't make it far when he grabs her wrist.

"Hey," she turns her head to look at the hand holding onto her wrist loosely, "thanks for tonight. It meant a lot," he tells her. The pad of his thumb slides across the vein of her wrist and into her palm and she gives him an easy smile.

"It's the least I can do. I mean, I'm guaranteed an A for this math exam, right?" she teases, and Wally blinks, as if he's suddenly remembering the purpose of all the late nights and runs between cities.

"Aw, man, I can't believe I forgot the point of all this," he murmurs, smacking himself on the forehead gently akin to whenever M'gann would have a _Hello, Megan!_ moment. "If you still need any help studying, just call and I'll be there in a flash."

The statement rests in the air for a few seconds before Artemis dares to address it.

"Really, Wally? 'There in a flash'? Do you realise how lame that is?" she gives him this unamused look with a slight shake of her head.

"Hey, it works for Uncle Barry!" he replies indignantly.

"You're not your Uncle Barry," she reminds him. As if he needs any more reminders. Wally rolls his eyes good-naturedly and reaches into the back pocket of his jeans. He fishes out a small pad of multicoloured sticky notes, as if he'd scribbled things onto the nearest ones he could find at the most random instances and then slapped them all together. He hands them to Artemis, who looks at them warily.

"And these are?"

"Last minute exam tips. Test is in two days, you have one more full day tomorrow to study," he shrugs and rocks back and forth on his feet, "I mean, I really don't think you need them but, you know, just in case you freak out or something." Artemis scoffs at him half-heartedly and he beams at her. There's a pause, and they both know they have to go opposite directions now because it's late and Artemis still needs to study as much as she can later this afternoon and Wally has a father to talk to, but in the dark of Gotham, under the faltering light bulb that illuminates the sidewalk in front of Artemis's apartment, with the early summer fireflies shimmering in spontaneous blinks of orange and white, there's a mutual agreement between the blonde and the redhead. They share one last look and they're aware of the promise that something great is going to happen, something absolutely, infuriatingly spectacular, and neither of them can wait for it to start.

But of course, _after_ all the exams.

With one last goodbye, Wally zips away, carrying a few lost leaves in his tracks, and leaving Artemis to step into her apartment finally, tucking the sticky notes into a pocket in her backpack. Unsurprisingly, her mother is still wide awake when she reaches the dimly lit living room.

"How was studying?" Paula asks before Artemis can even lean over to kiss her cheek. Artemis hums thoughtfully for a second, contemplating the question.

"I got more than I bargained for," she finally says, dropping her bag on the floor and walking around the couch to sit in front of her mother, who's perched comfortably on her wheelchair.

"Oh?" Paula looks up from the book she's reading to fix a curious look on her daughter, "is that a good thing?" Artemis plays with her hands and examines her fingers for a second as her mother studies her and waits patiently.

"Yeah," she answers confidently, in a quiet voice, "yeah, I think so."

**Gotham  
****June 4, Last Full Day Before Math Exam Day**

On Monday, while Wally attends his final full week of real school, Artemis stays in Gotham and studies for that wretched math exam. Her mother has a book club meeting to attend in downtown Gotham for the most of the afternoon and since there's a Starbucks there, Artemis takes the local bus with Paula and ends up studying in one of the more secluded corners of the café for the entire afternoon. In a miraculous turn of events, she comes across no less than three issues with the rest of her studying and she only really has to text Wally once to confirm that she's converting the standard form of a parabola into the vertex form properly and if she's completing the square the right way and not just butchering it. The sticky notes Wally gave her last night are helping a lot, though. They're stuck to the window next to her and on the coffee table she's occupying, leaving only a little bit of space for her coffee mug and making her workplace unexpectedly colourful with bright squares of yellow, blue, purple and green. Artemis keeps her hair down for the entire afternoon.

At some point, Artemis notices that the sun is setting. When she looks out the window in the areas that aren't being covered up by Wally's sticky notes, she's greeted with a sky that's a rare hue of deep blue for the beginning of summer in Gotham. Sometimes the air is blessed with a breeze that carries a swirl of dancing leaves, still green from spring. Artemis smiles when she spots children running ahead of their mothers, chasing the trail of leaves until they can no longer be reached. The sun-kissed streets are glowing a deep orange in the light of the sinking sun, and the bravest stars are starting to peek into the top floors of Gotham's towering skyscrapers.

The golden sun bleeds into the horizon, the daylight fades and Gotham is blanketed in a familiar coat of indigo. The stars blink on and off in a dazzling light show, and the sparkles remind Artemis of green eyes.

**Central City  
****June 4, Last Monday Before Exam Week**

The only way Wally wakes up on Monday is when his alarm clock beeps at an obnoxiously deafening volume right in his ear. He flails and jerks away from the alarm clock, far enough that he falls off of the bed and lands on the carpeted floor with a heavy thud, rattling his bedside drawer. When he finally cares enough to pick himself up off the floor, his eyes glance at the clock (08:43, he is _so_ late) and the only thing he remembers is that he had decided to confront his dad this morning.

He greets his mom hopping into the kitchen on one foot, tying the shoelaces of his sneakers with a toothbrush in his mouth, his backpack hanging off one shoulder, and his t-shirt still only partially on, exposing the pale, freckled strip of his toned stomach. His mother rolls her eyes and reaches over to grab his shirt just as he tries to hop to his seat at the table. She tugs his shirt down and he grins a frothy, pearly white grin at her.

He doesn't quite tell her that he plans to talk to his father – _really_ talk to him and dig up all the answers he's deserved for the past sixteen years. It's better if she just finds out later.

Wally speeds through the rest of the day with high anticipation of Tuesday morning resting in his chest, feeding his heart with energy. The talk with his dad could go very right or very wrong, or a little bit of both with heavy amounts of stress for both individuals. Wally falls asleep that night sending good luck texts to Artemis, who is pumped and ready for her exam.

And when Tuesday morning comes, Rudy thinks he can just walk out the door and drive to work but Wally literally speeds down the stairs and stops him right when he's finished slipping into his left loafer.

"Dad," Wally says in a clear voice, a serious look on his face. Rudy purses his lips but holds his patience.

"Wally, what is it? I have to be at work in half an hour."

"Work can wait. This can't," Wally says slowly and he stands up straighter, rising to his father's height.

"We need to talk."

**West Residence, Central City  
****June 6, 17:20 EDT**

"Okay, okay, okay, okay," Artemis mutters to herself repeatedly as she walks up Wally's porch. She's practically vibrating with all her perturbation and anxiety and she can't believe her molecules haven't sunken towards the core of the earth yet. She's sweating all the way to the finger-pads that are holding the stapled set of papers that she has yet to unfold and the sweat has nothing to do with the June sun. When she reaches up to knock on the front door, it swings backwards to reveal Wally's parents.

"Oh, hi dear!" Mary greets her cheerfully, stepping back to let her in.

"Hi Mrs. West, err, hi Mr. West – " Artemis nods to each parent when Wally skids into view on sock-covered feet.

"Artemis! What's up?" he chirps in a bright voice and the atmosphere of the house is suddenly so vibrant and loud, definitely far less melancholy than when Artemis had visited on Sunday, but she holds her tongue before asking what the hell is going on.

"So this is the girl you like," Rudy states nonchalantly out of nowhere and Wally squeaks. Artemis laughs weakly and starts to reconsider her decision in coming down to Central City in the first place. She holds her breath when Rudy puts a hand on her shoulder.

"Thank you, for being there for him," he says gently, a warm look in his brown eyes.

"It was nothing, sir," Artemis replies with no hesitation, the words tumbling out of her mouth automatically. Rudy smiles slightly.

"It was a little more than something," he says, but drops the topic and gives his son a look before stepping into the cool summer air.

"We're going to the grocery store for a while, we'll be back in an hour. Why don't you stay for dinner, Artemis?" Mary offers and before Artemis can refuse, Rudy agrees, "Absolutely! Let us get to know the newest expert in keeping our son's head on straight," he jokes. Wally sends him an unamused look.

"Thanks, Dad," he says, but he's smiling ever so slightly. He looks at Artemis and waits for a response. She sighs helplessly.

"Sure," she agrees wholeheartedly, "Why not!"

"Fantastic! We'll see you in an hour then," Mary says, waggling her fingers in a goodbye as both she and Rudy pile into the car and drive away. Wally shakes his head at his parents and invites Artemis in. She throws him a curious glance when they get to the living room.

"So I'm guessing you talked to your dad?" she says, sitting down gracefully on the couch. Wally leans on the doorway and crosses his arms, tilting his head to the side a little.

"Ehh, more like… _yelled_ at him." Artemis raises her eyebrows.

"And?"

"And he yelled back."

"…Oh," Artemis frowns, nodding to the direction of their front door, "then, what was that back there? What now?"

"Now… I guess we wait?" he shrugs and rubs the back of his neck, "Like, we talked and yelled a lot. I mean, I missed first period yesterday talking to my dad. But," he crosses his arms again, "I - I think he's starting to understand. And me, too. I understand a little bit more now." Artemis nods, sincerely relieved that Wally wouldn't have to be living in a broken home anymore.

"So, what're you doing here? How was the exam!" Wally exclaims, and in the blink of an eye, he's sitting next to her on the couch, bouncing slightly, eager to hear her results.

"I - uh, they're here," she says, holding up the folded papers. Wally frowns at the papers.

"It's a stack of papers, are you telling me you haven't _unfolded_ them yet?" he asks incredulously. Artemis scoffs at him, affronted, and whacks his shoulder with the papers but Wally only snickers sounding awfully like Robin on a particularly good day.

"I'm pissing my pants here, Wally, this thing'll determine my _life_ next year so forgive me if – "

"Alright, alright. Keep your pants on, princess!" he takes the papers from her, "We'll open it together. Jeez." Artemis snatches the papers from him, "That's what I had in mind, Kid. But _I'll_ open it." Wally mutters something akin to "rude" and "whatever" but leans in close. Artemis takes a deep breath and finally allows her fingers to open up the folded A4 papers. After an entire first semester of pure torture and no help, and then a second semester of equally as difficult units and unending all nighters, all of her work adds up here and now. She won't lie and say that she isn't nervous as hell because her fingers are shaking and the papers rustle along with her slight tremors. Wally finally whispers harshly for her to just open the damn thing and she quickly flips the sheets open. There, on the top right corner of her math exam lies the circled mark in red ink: 98.

98.

Ninety-freaking-eight.

Artemis lets out the breath she'd been holding in an astonished, "Oh, my god," barely registering Wally whooping next to her.

"Ninety-eight!" he laughs out loud, scrambling to his feet and pulling her up with him. He's overflowing with so much relief and joy and pride that he grabs her by the waist and sweeps her around the living room ecstatically. Artemis is so stunned by both his congratulatory actions and the grade itself that she just throws her head back and laughs with him.

"Ninety-eight percent!" he screams and they're kind of jumping around together and screaming in each other's faces.

"Ninety-eight percent!" she screams back at him, laughing hysterically, fisting the exam papers in her hands and shaking them at him triumphantly. A whole semester of all nighters and hard, _hard_ work. _So_ worth it.

Then, all at once, Artemis's arms are encircled around his neck, Wally's still got a firm but gentle hold on her waist, and the crumpled papers she'd previously flung into the air while they were dancing are drifting back down to the floor. Wally's smiling down at her and his eyes are shining so proudly. Artemis beams at him with a thrilled look upon her features. She leans up a little closer so that their noses are almost touching and her breath washes over his lips.

"Would it be perfect to kiss me _now_?" she asks him teasingly. He lets out a half-laugh, half-scoff but tilts his head so that their foreheads touch.

"I'd say so," he answers, and she grins mischievously.

"Then what're you waiting for?" she whispers, and no other words are needed. Wally closes the small distance between their lips and Artemis's fingers curl around the nape of his neck. He pulls her body closer to his and they are melting against each other, in Wally's living room, under the watchful light of the setting, orange sun. Artemis drops the exams, already forgotten, as she lets her hands slide from the back of Wally's neck to his jaw, then his cheeks, then his hair, and everywhere else. She smells like the rain, he breathes like the wind; she tastes like the sun, and he – he feels just like summer.


End file.
